a particular directory or, in most cases, are simply miss-referenced. External Links: This report lists external path references in your site. Because Dreamweaver has no way of really checking for external links, it will, at the very least, list them so that you can check them manually. Orphaned Files: Orphaned files are files that exist in folders in your site but are not directly referenced by your web pages. Assets, for instance, always appear in this list even when they are cloaked. Dreamweaver is simply providing a list of the files so that you can later go into your site and perform manual clean up of unused files. Before we demonstrate the process of checking links, let's actually create a broken link in our new sample.htm page. You can do this by opening sample.htm, placing your cursor on the page, and choosing the Hyperlink option from the Insert menu. When the Hyperlink dialog appears, enter values in the Text text box and enter a broken path in the Link field. Your values may be similar to mine (see Figure 4.36). Figure 4.36. Purposely enter a broken reference to index.htm so that we can see the Check Links Sitewide feature in action.   Click OK and save the page. Now we're ready to check the links. Checking links in your site can be accomplished using one of two methods. First, you can check the links for an individual file, and second, you can check links for an entire defined site. Because the process for both is similar, I'll demonstrate the check links site-wide feature here: 1. In the Files panel, highlight the defined site, right-click to access the context menu, and choose the Entire Local Site option from the Check Links submenu. The Results window appears with the Link Checker tab highlighted.   The Check Links submenu also features the Selected Files/Folders option. If you didn't need to check the links for the entire site, you can simply highlight the files and/or folders and choose this option. Also, the path we took to open the Link Checker is merely one method. Like every other feature in Dreamweaver, the Check Links feature can be accessed using numerous methods: the Link Checker can also be accessed directly from the Site menu by choosing Check Links Sitewide. Alternatively, you can choose the Check Links Sitewide option from Site submenu located in the Files panel Options menu. 2. With the Link Checker open, you'll notice a few options. First and foremost, in the top-left corner is the Show drop-down menu which offers the three options for link reports. Also notice that the dialog box is divided into two columns; the left side is the problematic file, and the right is the link causing the problem. 3. To fix the broken link, simply double-click the document in the Files column in the left pane. This opens the document and highlights the problematic link. Make sure that the Properties Inspector is visible and change the link in the Link text field of the Properties Inspector. Alternatively, click the troubled link in the Broken Links column on the right side of the dialog box. Now you can either type the link manually or click the folder icon to search for the appropriate file. After the file is found, the correct path is added and the reference to the broken link disappears from the list. You can also check the external links in your site by choosing the External Links option from the Show menu. As you can see from Figure 4.37, the Link Checker pane lists all the external link references, including the link to the public website and the mail link we created in the previous chapter. Figure 4.37. Check the external link references in your site by choosing the External Links option from the Show menu. [View full size image]