how to store common web content separately

[redss]

I have several web pages that all share the same graphical menu on top and the left, and I want to store that common html in its own file and include a reference to it in my content pages.

what is the easiest way to do that and be able to preview the completed pages in my browser? (without using php/asp/cfm, etc)

I am under the understanding that server side includes require the use of a web server to populate with the contents of the included file (making local preview difficult when not connected to the server), and besides, most websites I see have a .html extension not .shtml extension, so what technique are they using so that all the pages don't have to be individually updated when the top menu needs to be changed?

thanks!

[oilman]

If you ad the following line to your htaccess file (assuming you're on an apache server):

AddType text/x-server-parsed-html .htm .html

you will be able to use all the ssi you can stand :) Basically how it works is that the server sees the extension shtml and realizes that it should look for ssi on that page (it's the server default). It's set this way so that the server doesn't parse every page for ssi if it doesn't have to - only use resources as necessary. If you can put that line in you htaccess file you are now telling the server to parse all pages ending in htm and html for ssi.