Web page builder for Phoenix users

denro · Post by **denro** » December 1st, 2002, 11:15 pm

As I move away from IE and MS Front Page, I have been looking for a web page builder that is both an HTML editor and a WYSYG visual style developer, freeware like Phoenix. I think I finally found one that compliments Phoenix well. I discovered it in disucssions on the alt.comp.freeware news group. It is Trellian and its home page is
http://webpage.vendercom.com/index.html
You must register it, but that is free. You can delete the bmp that opens in the main window when you start the program; Trellian won't complain if it doesn't find the bmp. There is a closeable lower windows that advertises some extra services of the company that wrote trellian. But so you don't have to close it each time, look in the bottom of the ini file and set the height of the last window mentioned to 0. It is really a slick editor and possibly both more powerful and easier to use than FP. (I am not a fan of Composer, but will probably try the Mozilla editor again when 1.3 is released.) Sorry if this is off topic, but we are all interested in viewing web pages, we need to be able to write them as well.

Stefan · Post by **Stefan** » December 2nd, 2002, 6:18 am

To judge the quality of a WYSIWYG you need to look at the source it generates.

Just looking at the source for the webpage that promotes this editor I can't say I get very impressed.

priior · Post by **priior** » December 2nd, 2002, 6:58 am

denro.. no disrespect.. but marking up webpages is not hard (really)... just find urself a nice editor (i use editplus) and mark up urself... it'll take about 3-4hours to figure things out.. but then ur set for life

elFarto · Post by **elFarto** » December 2nd, 2002, 7:25 am

Nothing beats a simple text editor (aka Notepad, VIM, etc...) and <a href="http://www.w3schools.com/">http://www.w3schools.com/</a> IMO

Stephen

ishopnude_com · Post by **ishopnude_com** » December 2nd, 2002, 8:15 am

Or Textpad.. has been my main editor for years... works great for html,javascript,php, etc etc

Benjamin Lebsanft · December 2nd, 2002, 8:20 am

www.meybohm.de syntax highlighting, tag autocomplete, easy to use, ideal for lazy people like me

Post by **tve** » December 2nd, 2002, 8:27 am

for the start, I suggest some "semi-wysiwyg" editor like Macromedia HomeSite or AceHTML (free), thats how I learned web programming, now I use Proton from www.meybohm.de

Jykke · Post by **Jykke** » December 2nd, 2002, 9:14 am

Sometimes a WYSIWYG-editor is very useful when I am mass-producting pages. Creating pages with Notepad would be very slow. If I found a WYSIWYG-editor that creates decent html-code, I would be very pleased. If it was free, even more so.

Thank You Denro for this link! I'll give it a try.

insin · Post by **insin** » December 2nd, 2002, 9:49 am

ishopnude_com wrote:Or Textpad.. has been my main editor for years... works great for html,javascript,php, etc etc

Second that - plus you can use regular expressions on the files you edit, which has saved me hours worth of tedium.

If you use css for laying out your pages, and author them in xhtml, you really don't need a WYSIWYG editor as your code will be nice and clean - I find they only speed up the development process if you (*spit*) insist on using tables for everything(;)), as the time taken up debugging tables is reduced.

denro · Post by **denro** » December 2nd, 2002, 10:26 am

I didn't expect the rash of comments from people that didn't even try this editor. I am aware, and often joke about it, there is an attitude among many designers something like "real programmers use notepad to write web pages." I suppose we could extend that and say that they also don't use a modern graphical word processor but use DOS WordPerfect; and when they write their programming code, they don't use something like Borland Builder, MS Visual Studio or VS.net or one of the helpful freeware environments. I can and do write code, whether C++ or HTML, with just a console style editor, but I can also take advantage of a good graphical development environment. Trellian let's you do either or both. I prefer to do some things graphically, and then tweak the HTML by editing it directly. FP and Composer let you do that, but neither are very good, IMO. It was a pleasure for my web site to be able to easily resize the java script buttons I use by just dragging the button's edge with the mouse. Don't get hung up on "real web designers use notepad" or one of its fancier equivalents. You might even like a good graphical developer that puts together correct HTML and then let's you edit the code. So far, unlike FP, the HTML of Trellian looks solid and it has good support of css, forms, etc.

Post by **tve** » December 2nd, 2002, 10:38 am

i have no use for a wysiwyg editor, since I code my pages in XHTML+CSS, so a wysiwyg doesnt make any sense for me, but I never used eysiwyg editors anyway, even not when I began to learn HTML..

I'm not one who says "real programmers use notepad", but building webpages in wysiwyg editors is simply no fun in my opinion.. its just plain boring..

Post by **old Neil Parks** » December 2nd, 2002, 10:48 am

Same outfit that makes the wysiwyg editor that started this whole topic also makes a plain text editor (Codepad) that does syntax highlighting, and another product just for editing meta tags.

http://www.trellian.com/codepad/index.html

http://www.trellian.com/meta/index.html

Some Trellian products cost money, and others are freeware. Unfortunately, the company's web site does not sort out which is which--you have to look at the description of each individual product.

Both of the above claim to be free.

Post by **old Neil Parks** » December 2nd, 2002, 11:01 am

Re wysiwyg editors vs text editors:

Obviously, some people will prefer one type and some will prefer the other. That's why it's good to have a choice.

Personally, I have tried both varieties. I tend to use the text variety more often, but that's because i was not enamored of the particular wysiwyg editors that I have tried so far (Front Page Express, and AOL Press).

To my taste, notepad and its equivalents aren't bad--they just require working too hard. I find it easier to use an html-specific text editor, which is a plain text editor that includes menus for quick insertion of html tags.

I plan to try some of the products mentioned so far in this forum, and see if I like any of them better than what I have been using till now.

Keep an open mind. That's the only way you will find out what is best for you.

Stefan · Post by **Stefan** » December 2nd, 2002, 11:26 am

Jykke wrote:Sometimes a WYSIWYG-editor is very useful when I am mass-producting pages.

If you use proper CSS for layout and formating "mass producing" pages is at least as fast with notepad as a WYSI(not)WYG editor.
It will also make the pages a lot more accessible for eg diabled persons as well as severly shrink the total kB size of the site (vs eg a <table> layout).

I've yet to see any WYSI(not)WYG editor produce CSS code that isn't compleatly useless...

Stefan · Post by **Stefan** » December 2nd, 2002, 11:35 am

denro wrote:I didn't expect the rash of comments from people that didn't even try this editor. I am aware, and often joke about it, there is an attitude among many designers something like "real programmers use notepad to write web pages."

Hmm, at least my point was that "automatic" editors generally produce crappy code. Thus to get good code you HAVE to handcode in "notepad"-type editors, becuse WYSIWYG is not a viable option currently.

If you feel that I'm wrong, please provide a webpage you did with this editor that doesn't abuse <table> for layout or produce gennerally crappy CSS and JavaScript.
I'd be very pleasantly surprized if this is the case

Web page builder for Phoenix users

Web page builder for Phoenix users

syntax highlighting and meta tags

wysiwyg editors vs text editors