dialog boxes not appearing on top

BobInIndy1 wrote:
iWeb help dialog always appears under neath the iweb dialog box, meaning you cannot see it without moving things around

This is a common complaint among Leopard users. Help is no longer a separate app, that can be left open, hidden or whatnot. Hopefully Apple will listen to feedback and change things.

the download dialog box (firefox) no longer appears on top when you download something (like a pdf), meaning you have to move screens around to go looking for it.

If you close it, the next time it opens it should appear in the front. Is that not happening? Or, if you've left it open, it should stay in the background rather than jumping on you constantly like a poorly-trained puppy. You can quickly find it by pressing one of the Exposé keystrokes to show all windows (or all application windows, if you're already in Firefox).

BobInIndy1 wrote:
iWeb - displaying a help message where it cannot be seen makes no sense...are you saying that is the way it is suppose to work?

Well, I've been playing with it, and I can't figure out exactly what you meant. You said the help was appearing behind the "iWeb dialog box," but so far I haven't been able to duplicate this. The help window should float above everything else, but I thought it might stay behind a dialog window, which also wants to be in the front. But I can't make this happen in iWeb. Can you be more specific about what the "iWeb dialog box" is?

Dialog boxes are appearing where they cannot be seen. Yes, of course, you can jump through a bunch of hoops, move windows, etc and find it burried somewhere, but that makes no sense.

You seem to be using the term "dialog box" to refer to ordinary windows, like Firefox's Downloads window. Can you be more specific here?

A true dialog box, like an open or save dialog, should appear in the front, has no close box and can only be dismissed by clicking a button (such as Open or Cancel). A sheet window is similar to a dialog box, but is attached to a specific window, and thus may be moved behind other windows. Many apps use sheet windows for save dialogs. A regular window has a close box (red circle) and can be moved behind other windows. A floating window also has a close box, but it and the title bar are smaller than on a normal window, and it can't be moved behind other windows.

example: when you click to view a pdf from web, if the download screen appears under other screens, it makes you think the click did nothing.

You didn't answer my question. Was the Downloads window already open? If so, it will NOT jump forward when you download something else. This behavior is consistent across both Safari and Firefox. (Note that Firefox is not developed by Apple, thus this behavior in Firefox has nothing to do with the Mac OS.)

If the Downloads window was not already open, and it opened but appeared behind other windows, then that is strange. But in order to help, you're going to need to provide more specifics.

BobInIndy1 wrote:
Example: Boot Mac, no programs running, start iWeb app and the iWeb main window appears. Click on help

Ahh, this is why I was confused. The main iWeb window is not a dialog window.

Example: Boot MAC, no programs running, start FireFox, navigate to a URL to display a PDF file, click on it, nothing seems to happen.

Okay, that helps. If I open the Downloads window, quit Firefox and then start it back up again from scratch, the Downloads window is closed. (In other words, Firefox didn't remember I had it open and open it again the next time.) If I then click a PDF link, it asks me if I want to open in another app or save to disk. If I ask it to save, the Downloads window pops up in the front.

So, we've clarified exactly what's going on, and I'd definitely say that what's going on in your case isn't right. Unfortunately, I don't have a solution. Have you tried this with a different user account on the same machine?