[Robo]

...er...yeah.

Pretty self-explanatory here. I'd like something powerful that doesn't hold my hand ("Now choose from our limited quantity of templates that you'll be able to slightly customize later!") but not too convoluted or difficult. And I'm not exactly rich, either.

Any suggestions?

[Brad]

TextEdit.

Though, I personally use SubEthaEdit. It's free for personal use.

If you want a WYSIWYG (aka. grossiness maximus) editor, there's the open source (and free) Nvu from the Mozilla project.

[Moogs]

Freeway Express is only $99 and supposedly has good standards support. It operates like a print layout program so if you're used to Quark or InDesign you'll probably like it. I've not tried it but some people swear by Freeway, so give the demo a look.

[torifile]

There's one called Tag. I've got it. I don't like it too much (having closing tags automatically inserted for me is disconcerting) but it's slightly easier to use than a straight text editor.

[drewprops]

Now you guys, you know that he's talking WYSIWYG, drag-n-drop editing. I recommend finding an old copy of Pagemill and running it on an an old OS9.x machine. You can't get much cheaper than that!

btw, Freeway Express looks awesome!

[scratt]

BBEdit.

[sunrain]

I'll put in another vote for SubEthaEdit.

Learn a little HTML. It won't hurt you and you'll get laid so much satisfaction on those lonely nights out of building a site by hand.

[drewprops]

yeah, HTML=SEX.....
Whenever somebody asks for an easy webpage application the hand-coders come out of the woodwork. I started out in Pagemill, went to GoLive, then to Dreamweaver. Along the way I learned my fair share of HTML but I didn't really know the basic elements of HTML. In the last 18 months I've really learned so much and feel really comfortable when hand-coding, which is about all I do now though I must confess that I still experience a guilty pleasure when I jump into GoLive or Dreamweaver.

[AsLan^]

What do you guys think of rapidweaver ? I was considering buying it to redo my site.

[scratt]

Originally Posted by AsLan^ What do you guys think of rapidweaver ? I was considering buying it to redo my site.

Never heard of it... linky?

[Batman]

jEdit all the way. It is a really good tool for hand coding, well, anything for that matter. But - if you can afford it, I suggest Macromedia Dreamweaver 8 - don't bother with the Adobe crap. It all depends what you are doing.

[AsLan^]

Originally Posted by scratt Never heard of it... linky?

RapidWeaver

I downloaded the demo and tried it out but I'm still undecided

[AsLan^]

Originally Posted by Batman jEdit all the way.

I'll second jedit as a great editor.

I generally use jedit on Linux and Textwrangler on mac, except sometimes I use jedit on mac too.

[scratt]

Originally Posted by Batman jEdit all the way. It is a really good tool for hand coding, well, anything for that matter. But - if you can afford it, I highly suggest Macromedia Dreamweaver 8 - don't bother with the Adobe crap.

Recommend is a bit strong... It's my workhorse for web design... But you need to know a little hand coding to optimise your sites and also get rid of the horrible glitches it puts into web pages..

So yes, by all means use DW to put pages together and manage your website.. But do not rely 100% on the WYSIWYG side of it because with DW WYSI not necesarily WYG!

[SledgeHammer]

I use Dreamweaver for the basics. It makes assembling the site a lot easier, but I keep it in split-view mode so I can always watch the code and change what I need to. And all my CSS is strictly hand-coded.

[Moogs]

Originally Posted by Batman But - if you can afford it, I highly suggest Macromedia Dreamweaver 8 - don't bother with the Adobe crap.

I know many people seem to agree with you on this, but I have to say, to this day I don't see what the huge advantage of DW8 is. I use both extensively and while DW8 is a very nice improvement, it still has its fair share of bugs and annoying interface quirks, and in general doesn't speed the development process over GL 8 to any meaningful degree. In fact if you use Smart Objects with GL a lot, DW might even slow you down a bit.

Each has certain things it excels at (GoLive's CSS support is still the best out there IMO), and each has areas that remain mediocre at best. What will be interesting from this point, is what happens to the two programs now that it seems the merger will go through (just a general observation). They have a lot of overlap so the idea that the two may merge somehow could make the whole argument moot.

[Batman]

I use dreamweaver in split and code view, but never strictly wysiwyg. It does have coding traits that I don't like, and go in and manually change. However, other than that, it is one of the best out there. As for CSS editing, I just use jEdit - nice and simple, along with TopStyle 3 Lite.

Why don't I like GoLive? For starters, I feal that it is just a less capable program on all fronts because of the following : The standard Adobe interface shouldn't be applied to a web design program. I see where it fits with graphics and all, but trying to sort through lots of floating panels to try and find one simple thing isn't my cup of tea. Also, GoLive, from what I have used it for, is comparable with Dreamweaver on the HTML front, but once you jump into dynamic data, GL gets left in the dust. As for smart objects - duh GL it is faster. Smart Objects are an adobe technology, and therefore work better with adobe products.

I would say more, but I don't want to hyjack this thread further than it already has gone...

[Moogs]

All I was saying relative to Smart Objects is that their very presence will speed web development for people pulling a ton of graphic elements from PS or Illustrator. Even if it is an Adobe technology, that doesn't make it count any less as a useful thing. As far as the interface, DW8 is much better than prior versions with the tabs, but in general I think DW's interface sucks.

Dialog boxes that hide data from you and yet cannot be manually resized, the goofy palette stacking metaphor that is pretty much inferior to GoLive's custom workspaces and stowable palettes in every way IMHO, etc. The point is it's a subjective thing in large part yet people always write GL off like it's not even competing. Anyway I agree we shouldn't hijack... back to cheap and easy WYSIWYG options.

[Robo]

Originally Posted by sunrain I'll put in another vote for SubEthaEdit. Learn a little HTML. It won't hurt you and you'll get laid so much satisfaction on those lonely nights out of building a site by hand.

I know HTML. As fun as it would be to handcode everything...I do sorta want a WYSIWIG editor.

I guess that means I'm just not cool, huh?

[scratt]

Originally Posted by Roboman I know HTML. As fun as it would be to handcode everything...I do sorta want a WYSIWIG editor. I guess that means I'm just not cool, huh?

No. I think the views of a few people here are spot on...
Use something like DW to flesh out the bare bones of an idea.. It is a quick and easy way to position pictures, import text, spell check it etc. etc.
But do make sure you learn at least a little HTML and some style sheet stuff.. Hey and if you have time the rudiments of Perl, PHP and JavaScript.

That way you can spot problems / inefficiencies that DW puts into pages, and also make your pages interactive (Java), collect data from forms and process it (Perl PHP), and make your site look a little modern (Style sheets / css).

Once you have even the basics of those skills then you can start to complete web sites which are akin to what people expect.

Perl and PHP are really a doddle to pick up if you have any programming background at all, and if you know C or C++ it's easy.

[drewprops]

I'm going to throw a vote in for GoLive because it isn't entirely as crappy as some would have you believe. Yes, it created the most incredibly bloated rollover scripts in earlier versions but its CSS support and its "structure" view beats anything else I've ever seen when you're trying to "see" you code. It allows you to "open" DIVs and other structural elements that have open/close calls like you do with folders in classic OS 9 mode. Spotting overlapped or missing DIVs is intuitive and allows you to spot problems quicker than dragging your eye through raw code.

The palettes aren't nearly as nasty as they're made out to be, and in the old version I'm running they DOCK to the side of the screen when inactive, thereby giving you lots of screen real estate. I personally find Dreamweaver's palettes bizarre and hard to work with in many situations. There's a certain "built with Flash" feel to the Macromedia apps that make them feel un-Mac-like at times - not sure what it is.

For someone who lives inside of Illustrator and Photoshop most of my workday, the GoLive palettes begin to make sense. Especially the CSS palette (though I personally enjoy using CSSEdit). I have been using Dreamweaver more lately, though I don't know why... especially since I can get it all done in SubEthaEdit or BBEdit just as easily. Using a WYSIWYG editor for handcoding is rather silly.

[Mac+]

Just curious about all this - do you think Apple will ever step into the fray here and offer a WYSIWYG HTML editor? Surely they'd do it right.™

[drewprops]

I'm done guessing about what Apple will or won't do.... wasted too much time about that in the past. Here's a question: does Apple's page layout software called "Pages" output HTML? I think it does.... of course, it might be as craptacular as the output from Word. If you EVER see the shit that Word generates and understood how messed up it is, you'd make poop in your pants and then mail it to Redmond.

[Moogs]

I think Apple would be a natural choice to build a professional WYSIWYG editor but I don't know if it's in the cards or not. Could even make it cross-platform to give Windows users a glimpse of Apple goodness on the pro side. Given how nice their pro app interfaces are, I think they'd do a terrific job.

[Mac+]

Yeah, I'm no editor or code monkey, but just by reading the posts in this thread, it seems like a niche where they could once again leave their mark.

Mind you, with Aperture and iPhoto, Preview and other media based apps, they are certainly learning how to tip-toe around Adobe - or at least find the gap that they can exploit without rocking the boat too much.

[SledgeHammer]

Originally Posted by drewprops I'm done guessing about what Apple will or won't do.... wasted too much time about that in the past. Here's a question: does Apple's page layout software called "Pages" output HTML? I think it does.... of course, it might be as craptacular as the output from Word. If you EVER see the shit that Word generates and understood how messed up it is, you'd make poop in your pants and then mail it to Redmond.

I've taken some web pages that were created in Word, gone through the HTML and reduced them to a fraction of their original size while not only not losing anything, but improving the site along the way. Whenever anyone I know shows me a web page they made with Word, I yell at them.

[AsLan^]

*bump*

So... did anyone have an opinion on Rapidweaver ?

[scratt]

Originally Posted by AsLan^ *bump* Did anyone have an opinion on Rapidweaver ?

I had a look.. I don't like it as it feels too restrictive..

However, I am trying an experiment for you.. My wife knows nothing about Web Design. She has learnt a little html for basic formatting and knows enough to manage a menu driven online store.. So she knows how to work with / optimize images etc.. But that's about it.

A friend of mine wants a web site doing, and I don't have time.. So I have asked Julia to do it tomorrow for me.. Really simple one.. Two or three pages. It will be her first time doing anything like it, and her first time using any kind of web creation package..

I'll let you know on Weds how many grey hairs I gained tomorrow...

Later..

[AsLan^]

Originally Posted by scratt I had a look.. I don't like it as it feels too restrictive.. However, I am trying an experiment for you.. My wife knows nothing about Web Design. She has learnt a little html for basic formatting and knows enough to manage a menu driven online store.. So she knows how to work with / optimize images etc.. But that's about it. A friend of mine wants a web site doing, and I don't have time.. So I have asked Julia to do it tomorrow for me.. Really simple one.. Two or three pages. It will be her first time doing anything like it, and her first time using any kind of web creation package.. I'll let you know on Weds how many grey hairs I gained tomorrow... Later..

Great, thank you

[smiley]

I started out using vi and/or emacs from the shell.

Having said that, I tried out a demo of rapidweaver and bought a copy the next day. Does it do everything I want? no. But when I need a site up for a freind or a client really quick, I can quickly get the content in place and then apply either a supplied template or create my own. What I never liked about using a text editor is that I had to do the content at the same time I was doing the interface/layout. Add in PHP or Javascript coding to the mix and my head started hurting real quick.

RW allows me to create all the content I need and THEN experiment with look and feel. It even let's me get down to the code to write in my favorite PHP.

In short, it lets me focus each side of my brain separately. No more migraines.

The newest beta is pretty cool too. Buy the stable version now and get the new beta for free when it goes gold. Best $40 bucks you ever spent.

But YMMV.