MSJC Administration of Justice Department

This repo is a restored snapshot of a 2006-era Mt. San Jacinto College “Administration of Justice and Corrections” site.

The project is intentionally static and legacy-accurate: pages are XHTML-era documents and much of the page chrome (header/menu/footer) is assembled with JavaScript via document.write().

It also preserves an early, pre-standards take on “responsive design”: instead of modern CSS media queries (which weren’t widely used yet), the site uses JavaScript to detect browser/screen width at runtime and switch between resolution-targeted stylesheets.

URLs

• Live preview (deployed): https://adminofjustice.fcjamison.com/
• Local dev (VS Code task default): http://msjcadministrationofjustice.localhost/
  • In this workspace, the Open in Browser task is typically generated/managed by the local setup script (it may rewrite .vscode/tasks.json). If your local vhost uses a different hostname, update .vscode/tasks.json → task Open in Browser → the second entry in args.

How to preview locally

This site is meant to be served by a local web server (not opened directly as file://) so relative paths, script loading, and the Flash emulator (Ruffle) work consistently.

• If you’re using the included VS Code task, run “Open in Browser” (it opens the configured *.localhost URL).
• Otherwise, serve this folder with your local web server and open /index.html.

Quick option (no virtual host)

If you just want a quick static server without configuring *.localhost, run from the repo root:

• python -m http.server 8000
• Open http://localhost:8000/

Project layout

• Top-level *.html
  • Main site pages (index.html, degree.html, coursesaj.html, etc.)
• courses/
  • Popup course description pages (e.g. courses/aj101.html)
• resources/css/
  • Base layout styles: stylesheet.css
  • Resolution variants (auto-selected by setPage.js): stylesheet0800.css, stylesheet1152.css, stylesheet1280.css
  • Additional alternate stylesheet referenced by pages: stylesheet1024.css (titled 1600 x 1200, not auto-selected by setPage.js)
  • Menu styles: jamExpressMenu.css
  • Popup styles: popup*.css
• resources/scripts/
  • Page assembly / layout: header.js, footer.js, setPage.js
  • Navigation: jamExpressMenu.js
  • Popups: popup.js, popupheader.js, popupfooter.js, setPopup.js
  • Course list generators: courses_aj*.js, courses_corr*.js
  • Flash emulator runtime (vendored/offline): resources/scripts/ruffle/
• resources/flash/
  • Original SWFs used by the site (header.swf, popupheader.swf)

Page composition (legacy include pattern)

Most pages follow this pattern:

1. Load base CSS and alternate resolution CSS.
2. Load resources/scripts/setPage.js.
3. Build the header and menu by including scripts inside the markup:
   • resources/scripts/header.js writes the header HTML (and the SWF container)
   • resources/scripts/jamExpressMenu.js writes the navigation markup
4. Content is regular XHTML markup for the specific page.
5. Footer is injected with resources/scripts/footer.js.

Because the site uses document.write(), script order matters.

Resolution switching (setPage.js)

resources/scripts/setPage.js implements a 2006-style “responsive” layout — a JavaScript-driven precursor to today’s responsive CSS:

• It enables one of the <link rel="alternate stylesheet" title="…"> entries based on the current browser width (800 x 600, 1152 x 864, 1280 x 1024).
• Otherwise it falls back to the base stylesheet.css (roughly the 801–1025px/default layout).
• It stores the chosen layout in a cookie: msjc_res_layout (or clears it for the default layout).
• It sizes #content, #sidebar, and #pageInfo heights to fill the viewport when the page is shorter than the window.

Sticky footer behavior

The footer is fixed to the bottom of the viewport in the base stylesheet:

• resources/css/stylesheet.css: #footer { position: fixed; bottom: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; }

Since a fixed footer can overlap content when the page scrolls, setPage.js adds bottom padding to #content/#sidebar/#pageInfo when the document is taller than the viewport.

Header animation (Flash → Ruffle, fully offline)

The original site used Flash for the header animation. Modern browsers no longer run the Flash plugin, so this repo uses Ruffle (a Flash emulator) to render the original SWF.

Key files:

• resources/scripts/header.js

  • Writes a container (#flashHead) and a legacy <object>/<embed> fallback.
  • Loads the local Ruffle loader from resources/scripts/ruffle/ruffle.js (no CDN).
  • Sets window.RufflePlayer.config.publicPath = 'resources/scripts/ruffle/' so Ruffle can find its bundled JS/WASM chunks offline.
  • Builds the SWF URL with query parameters (logo text, colors, and a link target).
  • Enables autoplay (autoplay = 'on') and hides overlays (unmuteOverlay = 'hidden', splashScreen = false).

• resources/scripts/popupheader.js

  • Same approach as header.js, but with ../ paths and popup dimensions.

Important gotcha: do not shadow window.URL

Ruffle (and modern web APIs) rely on the built-in window.URL constructor. Avoid declaring a global variable named URL in these scripts.

Navigation menu (jamExpressMenu.js)

The dropdown menu is generated at runtime by resources/scripts/jamExpressMenu.js:

• Menu data lives in arrays (tmenu, tlink, ttype).
• Markup is emitted via document.write().
• Submenus are shown/hidden by toggling display on #subMenuN elements.
• Menu alignment is inferred from the .topMenuLink CSS float value (from resources/css/jamExpressMenu.css).

Course lists and popups

Course list pages (e.g. coursesaj.html) generate their lists with scripts like:

• resources/scripts/courses_aj.js
• resources/scripts/courses_ajCore.js

These scripts:

• Build parallel arrays: course number/title/units/link.
• Write a row per course.
• Use javascript:popUp('courses/<file>.html') to open the description.

Popup behavior is controlled by:

• resources/scripts/popup.js (chooses popup dimensions based on screen.width and opens the window)
• resources/scripts/popupfooter.js (Print/Close buttons; attempts to resize the popup to fit content)

Offline notes / external links

Most assets (CSS/JS/images/SWF/Ruffle) are local and can run offline when served from a local web server.

Some links are still intentionally external:

• Some navigation items link to external MSJC pages (e.g. schedule).

The footer’s “Valid XHTML 1.1” badge is served locally (no hotlinked image).

Troubleshooting

• Header area is blank

  • Open DevTools Console and look for Ruffle load errors.
  • Verify resources/scripts/ruffle/ exists and is being served.
  • Confirm window.RufflePlayer.config.publicPath matches the page depth (resources/... vs ../resources/...).

• Header shows but looks tinted

  • The Ruffle background color is set in header.js / popupheader.js and should match the site header background.

• Menu doesn’t drop down

  • Ensure resources/css/jamExpressMenu.css is loading.
  • Ensure jamExpressMenu.js is included after the header container is written.