Error Message When You Use Publish Web Command to Copy Web Remotely

SYMPTOMS

When you use the Publish Web command to copy an existing web to a remote Web site, you may receive one of the following error messages:

An unexpected Web Extender error occurred on the server. Authors- please contact the Webmaster for this server's site. WebMasters- please see the server's logs for more details.

-or-

Poorly formed http response.

WORKAROUND

To work around the limitations of the time-out period, use any of the following methods:

* Use a faster modem. A 28.8 (28,800 bits per second [bps]) modem is twice as fast as a 14.4 modem.

* Use sub webs instead of a root web to avoid creating webs whose transfer speed exceeds the time-out period.

* Create the web remotely, on your staging server, in order to avoid having to transfer the web.

* Use the FrontPage Publishing Wizard to transfer your web, and then recalculate the links on the web when it reaches the server.

The FrontPage Publishing Wizard initiates an FTP session to your server and automates the transfer of FrontPage webs using FTP. FTP is not subject to the same time-out limitations as HTTP and can often move data more reliably. In addition, the Publishing Wizard allows you to transfer only the files that were changed since the last post, which results in less data being transferred. The FrontPage Publishing Wizard can be set to transfer all files or some files in the Web.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed at the beginning of this article.

MORE INFORMATION

When you use the Publish Web command to connect the FrontPage client to a server, the Web server creates a process to serve that request. After the client's account is validated, the client uses Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) to communicate with Author.exe on your server. Author.exe works as a Common Gateway Interface (CGI) script within the process generated by the Web server.

Web servers enforce a time-out period on any process in order to protect the server from being overloaded. On most servers, this time- out period varies. When the connection speed between the client and the server is slow, and the size of the web to be transferred is large, the server may stop serving FrontPage before the transfer is complete.

The following formula is used to calculate the time-out period:

Seconds to transfer = Web size/modem speed

where "Web size" is the total bits of data that make up the web, and "modem speed" is the speed, in bits per second (bps), that the modem uses to transfer data (for example, 14,400 bps or 28,800 bps).

(Web in K * 1024) * (8{Bits} + 4{bits overhead}) = (Web in K * 12288)

The following is a sample table showing transfer times in seconds.

                                   File Size

                 500K      1000K    5000K     10000K   20000K

                 --------------------------------------------

   14,400 bps    427        854     4267       8534    17067

   28,800 bps    214        427     2134       4267     8534

NOTE: When you calculate the size of the web, you must include data in all folders in the web to be copied, not just the static HTML files. Note that connection speeds are frequently slower than the maximum speed of the modem.

The information in this article applies to:

         Microsoft FrontPage 2000