Choosing a WYSIWYG editor Notepad versus Textpad versus Wordpad

[serengeti]

I made my first website in August or so of last year (2005). I initially used a template provided by my web host provider. Thereafter, I learned html and redesigned the site into a much more simpler form, fully hand coded. I also played around with a bit of css, but than decided to keep it all html as it was a small site. I now have two sites, both html designed and very basic with mostly written content and no graphics.

However, I don't feel comfortable learning tables in html to split the page into sections etc... so I still have the google adsense code in a long box across the top of the screen instead of trying to play around with skyscrapers on the left/right etc.. I also have links on the top instead of trying to place them on the right hand side or bottom corners etc...

When you look at the source code of other sites out there, you see dozens of <td>'s, <tr>'s, <th>'s etc.. oftentimes not even aligned properly to make is easy to see what's going on!

Do you guys think that most people use WYSIWYG editors or actually manually put in all those <td>'s <tr>'s and <th>'s on their web pages?

What is the best free WYSIWYG editor out there for basic/intermediate websites?

And do you guys recommend notepad, textpad, wordpad or MS word if I don't use a WYSIWYG editor? Right now I usually use notepad, nut I have all four on my computer.

Thanks if you read this far!

[vacorama]

tables can be a bit tricky.. but honestly, those WYSISYG editors can really hold you back if you are really looking to learn and advance your skills. I wish i could go back in time to when i first started web stuff and do things a bit different.. I wasted almost 2 years messing with dreamweaver, not understanding half the code that was being outputted when i could have been learning the right way from the ground up. There are a few extremely powerfull text editors that can save you hours of time every week if you take the time to tackle the initial learning curve.. Vim and Emacs are the most popular... They both have syntax highlighting which is a huge help. I personally use Vim... [vim.org...]

[FrostyMug]

i like dreamweaver.

[Don_Hoagie]

Do you guys think that most people use WYSIWYG editors or actually manually put in all those <td>'s <tr>'s and <th>'s on their web pages?

Well that would be a bit masochistic to be manually inserting bloated code, wouldn't it?;) Indeed, the great majority of people (remember, they don't have to be web designers to post content on the web) are using some kind of WYSIWYG, be it an HTML editor, CMS tool, or some kind of wuss-App that claims to serve up HTML (cough... MS Word... cough...).

It is definitely taking the high road to code by hand, but it's a chicken-before-the-egg thing... if you were an extremely precise coder to begin with, you could use a WYSIWYG and get great results. But of course, why would you ever bother to develop those skills when you could just "draw table"?

In the end I always say it depends on your needs- if you're a member on this forum, chances are good that you design websites. If that's the case, you ought to know all there is to know about the code you use, and the best way to do that is to use a straight editor. But if you enjoy designing your personal blog, or something like that... you probably have better things in life to do than master the code, and a WYSIWYG will save you lots of time.

Incidentally, I wouldn't suggest using any of your Windoze-native editors... even Notepad has some pitfalls when trying to create HTML with it. There are a handful of excellent text editors out there for free that are much better suited for HTML editing... personally I use Edit Plus.

[serengeti]

Thanks for the replies so far.

According to PC World, the top 5 HTML editors are/were:

1)CoolPage
2)CuteHTML
3)HotDog PageWiz
4)CofeeCup Free HTML
5)Site Builder

Any experiences of these?

[nazlfrag]

I would tend to agree with the above, the best wysiwyg editor is texpad + firefox. This means learning what all those tags stand for, and realising the bad formatting is due to these editors. The learning curve is steeper, but there is ultimately one best way to make a script, and that is by hand. Any automated tool has severe limits compared to using the language itself.

[Gypsy_Linda]

i like dreamweaver.

me too!

I will admit though, it has crippled me on understanding code. In the beginning I needed to jump in quickly, so I chose that route.

It's like...yes, it IS handy AND practical to know the mechanics of an automobile before getting in and driving it. *But* how many people really take the time to learn? I just want to hop in and drive...nevermind that down the road it may occur that I actually have to lift the hood and figure something out. It is then that I scratch my head and wished I had taken Auto Shop in high school.

Thank god for men! heheh

I started learning code when friends needed custom blogs built. Then even more so when having to customize templates in an e-commerce platform.

I struggle and muddle through it, but I also wish I had learned right off the bat.

My advice? If you have the time. LEARN CODE!

[txbakers]

I use Textpad and nothing but Textpad.

I build my tables by hand and know how to adjust them if needed.

There isn't a line of code in the file that isn't absolutely needed.

I'll admit that when I first started I used Dreamweaver to help me write the database connection/query code, but quickly abandoned it once I understood the base code.

[Mokita]

Notepad and HTML-Kit.

[Lobo]

there only is Dreamweaver, all the rest are just pretending...

You have to know code .. yet only to look at a page and know where the problem is... even with DW you will cut and paste snippets in to the code view ...

But if you want to try anything other than dreamweaver, then .. don't .. IMO