Dreamweaver: Nested Editable Regions Error
Some people are encountering Dreamweaver nested editable region errors in Templates with Dreamweaver 8. After some checking, I came across a solution; not sure if it's the only solution, but it's works, it's logical, and … it works.
Bottom line: check the Template's code well — not just the Editable Region tags. You may find that there's a missing tag somewhere; for instance, a missing </head> tag — which is why Dreamweaver is determining that you've got Editable Region nesting errors.
If a tag isn't closed (say, the </head> tag is missing), then the editable <head> area isn't closed … and so the next editable area (for instance, your content area) is obvious "nested" … in the head region. It's an HTML coding error, rather than a DW error.
Unfortunately, DW may not alert you by noting that the </closing> tag is missing. But let's remember that it's the weird coding that was throwing DW in the first place.
Kudos to the person in the Macromedia forms who gave a hint of the solution; sorry I don't recall the name.
24 Comments to "Dreamweaver: Nested Editable Regions Error"
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Brian O'Gorman says:
Comment posted on 01/24/06 @ 3:55 am
Hi Diane,
Read the above with interest.
Have just migrated to Dreamweaver 8 and have used the updater to install the latest update.
Am not an experienced developer but have developed a site using 2004mx (www.faith.org.uk). All pages are based on a template (www.faith.org.uk/Templates/Faith.dwt).
When I use DM 8, I find on most pages I cannot edit the main section of the page in design view(I get the "blocked" symbol). If I switch to code view, I can usually make the area editable by clicking/marking some of the code and returning to design view, but when I close the page and open it again the blocking still occurs.
I also find that paragraph formatting created in 2004mx gives much larger spacing in 8.
I would very much value your advice, Diane. It is driving me mad! I have almost 300 pages on the site! Sure it is something wrong with the template.
Regards
Brian
DianeV says:
Comment posted on 01/24/06 @ 4:25 am
Interesting. I copied your DW Template, saved it in Dreamweaver, and created a page from it. The result was just as you stated: the content section was protected from editing (just the effect we *don't* want). Code view revealed that it all went awry (that is, everything afterwards was greyed out, including the content section) starting with this in the <head> section:
That would, to me, indicate that DW is balking at that point. To test, I removed just that piece of code and saved the Template, which updated the page I'd created … and the content section was no longer protected from edits.
I'm not quite sure why that code is stated in that particular way. It appears to be just an absolutely-positioned div, in which case that ought to be in the CSS section (rather than as a ParamWhatever — not quite sure what that is). If you need the code, moving it to the CSS section would enable you to (a) use it and (b) not have this Template problem. <grin>
One tip: with a large site, you might look at moving all your CSS to an external file, and simply calling it from your Template. Then, when you make changes to the CSS, you only upload the CSS file rather than the entire website every time.
abbas says:
Comment posted on 05/31/06 @ 3:37 am
when i see in browser error comes that prob in line 105(nested editable regions
Diane Vigil says:
Comment posted on 05/31/06 @ 3:43 am
Ah. That may be. But the solution is to check your code, because somewhere Dreamweaver is detecting a coding error. It may not be exactly where DW says it is, but somewhere something is missing or incorrect.
NV says:
Comment posted on 06/20/06 @ 8:22 am
I was having this same maddening problem. I found that using "Commands -> Clean up XHTML" fixed the problem. The summary said that 3 tags were made into lowercase, and that somehow fixed the problem. It might be different for you, but worth a shot I guess.
Diane Vigil says:
Comment posted on 06/20/06 @ 8:26 am
Interesting. It's possible that you were using a doctype that required lower case? At any rate, thanks for the great tip; particularly good if the other stuff doesn't do it.
Dave says:
Comment posted on 06/27/06 @ 10:00 am
Your fix was right on. My page was missing a head tag. I search Google for Dreamweaver nested editble region error and came right to your page.
I was missing a closing head tag (ouch), and that fixed it. Thanks.
Diane Vigil says:
Comment posted on 06/27/06 @ 10:21 am
Dave, I'm glad I could be of help, which is why I wanted to share this data.
As to your missing </head> tag, that's what I was missing on one of my templates, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't missing before I moved to DW8. Just one of those mysteries, I guess?
Vix says:
Comment posted on 02/1/07 @ 8:13 pm
Hi Diane,
One of those mysteries indeed - as I tell all my students DW is a great tool but without the knowledge of HTML you will never sort out these "mysteries"
thanks for the tip saved a few hours of grief
Vix
Diane Vigil says:
Comment posted on 02/1/07 @ 8:24 pm
You're welcome, Vix. I know what you mean; if you can't read HTML, then you'll have problems anyway (and more often).
At any rate, I'm glad it was of help. I figure that we all help each other. :)
merle says:
Comment posted on 03/3/07 @ 2:27 pm
Just posting to say I had this same problem. I had one image without ALT text. Once I fixed that the template was able to be created.
Diane Vigil says:
Comment posted on 03/3/07 @ 4:26 pm
Thanks, Merle. It's good to know that something like missing ALT text might also cause a problem.
Changyang319 says:
Comment posted on 04/18/07 @ 2:38 am
thx, it's really works.
after check, it's missing tag.
Scott says:
Comment posted on 06/13/07 @ 1:43 pm
Thanks for the tip. I put in Nested Editable Regions into Google and this was the first site. I had a extra tag in there!
Scott
Lynn says:
Comment posted on 02/7/08 @ 7:17 am
I appreciate the information. Could not figure out what was wrong. Googled and found this site - most helpful. I was missing a in the template.
Thank you!
Lynn
Nabha says:
Comment posted on 03/13/08 @ 1:48 pm
Thank you! This also helped me.
Closing and reopening after fixing the code made it work again — it wouldn't work before then, even when I fixed the code error (a missing tag).
Jonathan says:
Comment posted on 04/3/08 @ 1:28 am
Hello everyone.
I am working on a template file (.dwt) at the moment, and whenever i try to save the file, i get the following error message, "There is an error at line 222, column 449….. Nested editable regions." I found that a tag is the main culprit here, as one of them is not closed. but when i tried closing it, the whole webpage goes haywire. I took over this website from the previous webmaster and am really lost as to what solution is available. Appreciate all your help! btw heres the code, its kind of long. sorry about that.
[snip]
Diane Vigil says:
Comment posted on 04/3/08 @ 9:21 am
Hi Jonathan. I had to delete your code, as it's not all displaying in any case. If you could upload the template and post a link, I could take a look.
At any case, I'd suggest that you move any JavaScript in the
area to an external file. Then take a look at what the nested editable area error might be.Gabriel says:
Comment posted on 05/10/08 @ 4:05 pm
Thanks for all the chatter on the "nested editable region."
Closing an open tag fixed the error when I first encountered it earlier today. The second time, however, I couldn't get the problem with the library item — a navigation bar — fixed.
I finally threw up my arms and removed the table containing the navigation bar from the library coding and pasted it into my template.
This isn't ideal, but it works.
Diane Vigil says:
Comment posted on 05/10/08 @ 5:25 pm
That's interesting, Gabriel. I've never run into this happening more than once, but it seems in any case that ensuring the coding is correct resolves it. Glad you got the first one fixed, though.
Sue says:
Comment posted on 06/11/08 @ 2:30 am
Hi all,
Am having a problem with Dreamweaver 8 and after looking at your comments above i still cant solve the problem.the site is www.hbfha.com and all pages are based on a template.
The message am getting is "there is an error at line 4, column 70 (absolute position 143: of nested editable regions". "making this change would require changing code that is locked by a template or a translator. the change will be discarded".
kindly assist.
sue
Diane Vigil says:
Comment posted on 06/11/08 @ 2:47 am
Interesting. On line 4, you have three BeginEditable doctitles:
There should only be one. Then, it gets closed twice … so one is technically "open" for the rest of the page (and, thus, everything else is incorrectly nested).
Would suggest making a backup copy of the DW Template, then editing it so that there's only one opening BeginEditable and one closing one.
If DW doesn't allow you to remove those, you may have to edit the Template in a text editor.
[By the way, the software for this blog turns double-dashes into one dash, so the above is not quite right … but it's correct in your Template.]
Sus says:
Comment posted on 06/11/08 @ 3:00 am
Hi Diane,
I am working on a template file (.dwt) at the moment, and whenever i try to update the new template into the existing web pages devleoped from an older template, i get the following error message, "There is an error at line 4, column 70 (absolute position 143: ….. Nested editable regions."
The template itself has no problem as am doing clean up html only that when i try to update the existing webpages, do i get the message. in the old pages i get this message "making this change would require changin code that is locked by a template or a translator. the change will not be discarded".
Please help.
Sus
Diane Vigil says:
Comment posted on 06/11/08 @ 7:30 am
Hi, Sus (Sue?). It looks like you posted the identical problem twice … did you see my solution at comment #22? The page I looked at contained that error in the Template region(s).