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I have just developed my first site in .asp using notepad the whole time. I really like being in total control, and I now know html pretty well because of it. But, now I have been given the task of developing lots of sites in a short space of time. I dont know why but something is telling me I need to change to a WYSIWYG editor. Am I right in thinking that FrontPage is going to get a beating here?. How does DreamWeaver handle .aspx? Will it complicate the code I have already written, or will it leave it be? Or is there a editor that I dont know about which is good for .aspx?
Cheers for your help.
I think is the reason why I like total control, and where my fears that a WYSISYG editor would do things I did not ask it to do.
This will only occur if you are not completely familiar with the program. FP allows you to set up your preferences so you do not overwrite code from other programs. It also gives you the ability to optimize your code at the same time, i.e. removal of white space, etc.
Why not just do the templates in Visual Studio?
I'm new to web design and have only built a few sites so far using Frontpage 2002. I too like the UI and seeing as most of my work encompasses text with some pictures/graphics, it works well for me. I'm still learning more and more every day and this field intrigues me to no end.
When you say "optimize" to remove "white space"...how is this done?
Tools > Page Options > HTML Source
Check
Tag names are lowercase.
Check
Attribute names are lowercase.
Uncheck
Allow line breaks within tags.
Indent
0 spaces.
Set your
right margin to 2500 characters.
This will eliminate all but the white space that appears after each block level element or <br>.
This was the first time I came in contact with HTML and CSS.
Then I learned a bit of these languages and produced my first pages using Notepad. I liked the way it was possible to control the code neat and clean, when coding by hand.
Then I tried Macromedia Dreamweaver MX, and at loved the way it produced the code - as I already knew some basics of html/css, I understood the way it worked. Also, I liked the powerful features of this program - like the possibility of moving/renaming of any file within a website folder, and then the auto link update accross all of the pages within that site.
Now I'm trying to learn MX, because I like the program. Yeah, its interface is maybe a bit harder to learn than that of FrontPage, but it's worth trying!
My personal vote goes for Dreamweaver MX - but of course, it's only my opinion; I won't say this is the BETTER of the two programs:-)
Well, I tried FrontPage XP, and I didn't like the way it produced pages - I didn't understand what code it produces, what are FP extentions, why do I need a host that supports FPE to upload there my pages, etc.
1) The FrontPage server extensions are server-base software that allows you to use "FrontPage components" such as shared borders, discussion boards, forms, etc. In that respect, they're like CGI scripts and server-side includes (SSI), except that they're easier for non-technical people to implement. Many hosting services offer the FP server extensions as a free option; for example, my hosting service--Pair Networks--uses them on the Apache Web server (which they're running on the BeOS operating system), and a Webmaster can request them simply by checking a box on the user console.
2) You need a host that supports the FrontPage server extensions *only* if you're using advanced FrontPage features that require them, and these are clearly identified in the FrontPage documentation. And while there are some advantages to having the FP extensions for basic Web publishing (e.g., being able to confirm that your local and remote Webs are identical down to the last filename), you can publish your Web via FrontPage's built-in ftp if the server extensions aren't available.
It sounds like you're satisfied with Dreamweaver, so the explanation I've given may be superfluous in your case, but maybe other users will find the explanation helpful. (IMHO, much of the criticism of FP is based on user ignorance. The program is extremely powerful, and--like any other program--it can by misunderstood or misused by people who haven't taken the time to learn about its features.)
Each tool does something better that the other.
FP has a much better WYSIWYG. You can throw all the inline javascript that you want at it and the WYSIWYG displays it all nice and neat. DW just pukes at stuff like that.
FP allows you to easily test your Javascript without the need to open a browser and constantly refresh the page. You simply click the preview tab. With DW you have to use a browser.
These two things do not seem like much, but it adds up over a long day.
DW, IMO has a better CSS interface.
DW also color codes the HTML *and* script. FP does not... that is the only reason I use DW more than FP.
They each have their place as a tool. If you ever expect to do much independent consulting, you had better be familiar with FP. I have picked up many contracts because the competition insisted the client switch to DW. Yeah right, like Mr. Small Business Owner wants to shell out $$ and learn a new technology so that he can update 3 images and 2 lines of text each month.
In short, I have seen terrible sites designed by people using DW and I know of great sites designed by people using FP - and vise versa.
Joe
P.S. - If you use DWMX, watch out for VBS files. It overwrites some of the characters in VBS files. This cost us 2 or 3 days work time until we found the problem was with the tool. But, who knows... they may have fixed the bug (we went back to DW 4).
I've used FrontPage for the past two years and have about 1,000 pages designed that use a top and left shared border. This afternoon I hit save on the top border like I've done hundreds of times and for some reason FrontPage erased EVERYTHING below the <head> tags on EVERY page. It left all of the ASP code above the head but every single page was just a top and left shared border with a blank body.
Luckily I had a two week old backup and hadn't made much changes in that time and it only set me back about three hours. However, it made me really wish I had switched to Dreamweaver over a year ago like I had planned.
I seriously can't find any good things to say about FP apart that any dummy
can learn to use it to do at least the basic stuff while DW's interface
kinda requires some knowledge of what you're doing...
just my two cents..
Is it possible to do this with FrontPage templates?
Yes, they are referred to as FP Includes. They function the same way an SSI (Server Side Include) does. They can not be edited at page level where they are included, you must open the include file to update and then it changes across all pages that reference that FP Include.
Jordan
