I don't want to sound too elitist, but my official opinion on the best web site production tool is a knowledgeable and experienced web designer. There are countless reasons for this opinion which would probably come off more like a sales pitch, so I'll bite my tongue on that side of things and just talk about the tools themselves. HTML stands for Hypertext Markup Language. The act of "marking up" a document goes back to the 13th century and the letterpress. Publishers would "mark up" a document so the letterpress operator would know how to lay out the document. HTML is just the electronic version of the same activity. In HTML, every "tag" has a special purpose. For instance, the paragraph tag delineates what is a paragraph. The text within <p> and </p> is the paragraph. Tools such as Dreamweaver or Frontpage or whatever tries to make an educated guess about what the user is trying to do. So, let's say you want to create a heading at the top of the page. Using Dreamweaver, you can just manually make the text large and bold. In reality, you should be using <h1> for that, rather than playing games with the font. To the layperson, as long as the text is big and bold, that's all that matters. There's a lot more to it than that, though. So, back to the tools, all of these tools make a guess about what you're really after, and they really need to perform a balancing act between doing what you say and doing what you mean. For most, like Frontpage, NetObjects Fusion, etc. they really spew out a lot of terrible code that can cause a lot of problems with cross-platform compatibility and maintenance of the site. When it comes to Dreamweaver, it'll still let you hang yourself, but it doesn't litter the code any more than you ask it to. My best advice, regardless of what tool you buy, is that you spend some time learning more about HTML. With proper knowledge of HTML, you'll be able to make the tool work for you, rather than you working for it. One more thing: If this is a website for a business, you really need to have a professional do it. Stanford University's Web Credibility Project (http://credibility.stanford.edu/) has been performing a long term study into credibility on the web. They've found that the quality of the site has a direct relationship to how much credibility a visitor ascribes to a site.
To illustrate this point, go to these two sites: http://www.istal.com/smoke/ http://www.webaccessstrategies.com Both organizations perform the same types of services. Which one are you likely to regard as more professional and more likely to produce quality work? Just some food for thought. Karl Groves Skype: eight.pistons AIM, YIM, MSN: karlcore http://www.karlcore.com <http://www.karlcore.com/> http://www.grayscalecms.com <http://www.grayscalecms.com/> http://www.thehotrodclassifieds.com <http://www.thehotrodclassifieds.com/> http://www.8pistons.com <http://www.8pistons.com/> _____ From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, October 02, 2007 12:10 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; chevelle-list@chevelles.net Subject: Re: [Chevelle-list] OT: Microsoft Publisher 2007 Karl, Well thats good to know, especially coming from a professional web site designer. In about a month I'll have some money saved up from my buisness...Is DreamWeaver the best web site designer? Or at least one that's pretty good. I'm fairly good with computers, and I know that websites are all HTML based. I've played with HTML a very very small amount, but that's it. The publisher just seemed pretty easy to use and would do what I wanted it to do(for now). I bought my domain on GoDaddy.com, and used thier little web site builder. It was absolutely horrible...That's why I was looking into publisher. -----Original Message----- From: Karl Groves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: 'The Chevelle Mailing List' <chevelle-list@chevelles.net> Sent: Tue, 2 Oct 2007 8:21 am Subject: Re: [Chevelle-list] OT: Microsoft Publisher 2007 As someone who makes web sites professionally, I can tell you that without a shadow of a doubt, Microsoft Publisher is absolutely the last thing I would use to create an HTML document. The markup it creates is hideous and everytime I see or hear about an HTML document created with Publisher, I want to gouge my eyes out. I write everything in Notepad, but I understand not everyone has the code-fu I have. If you're going to buy something, buy Dreamweaver. As web tools go, these tools are only as good as the person using them, but in the hands of a layperson, Dreamweaver is far less likely to create as much of a mess than most anything else. Karl Groves Skype: eight.pistons AIM, YIM, MSN: karlcore http://www.karlcore.com <http://www.karlcore.com/> http://www.grayscalecms.com <http://www.grayscalecms.com/> http://www.thehotrodclassifieds.com <http://www.thehotrodclassifieds.com/> http://www.8pistons.com <http://www.8pistons.com/> _____ From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> ] On Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, October 02, 2007 10:18 AM To: chevelle-list@chevelles.net Subject: Re: [Chevelle-list] OT: Microsoft Publisher 2007 Hey Mike....funny you're posting about this. I was just looking into buying Publisher yesterday. I have 2003 here at work. I want to make a webpage for my side buisness...however I dont think my work would appreciate me using thier stuff for another buisness. How do you like using Publisher? Are you saying that on 2003, when you create a webpage, you cant upload it to a site because its not HTML?? -----Original Message----- From: Michael Pell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: The Chevelle Mailing List <chevelle-list@chevelles.net> Sent: Mon, 1 Oct 2007 6:08 pm Subject: [Chevelle-list] OT: Microsoft Publisher 2007 I know this is way off topic, but.... I have a need to confirm that MS Publisher 2007 will or will not properly convert to .html. Would anyone have MS Publisher 2007 that would allow me to send them a .pub file to convert, then send it back to me as .html in a .zip file? If it works out, I'll just buy Publisher, but don't want to spend the money only to find it doesn't convert any better than the 2003 version that I already have. And the 2007 trial version doesn't let me publish as .html. Please email me privately: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Thanks, Mike -- I would rather live my life as if there is a God, and die to find out there isn't, Than live my life as if there isn't, And die to find out there is. -Blaise Pascal WHOSE CRUEL IDEA WAS IT FOR THE WORD "LISP" TO HAVE "S" IN IT? - unknown Check out my webpage at http://www.ProStreetCar.com <http://www.prostreetcar.com/> TREMEC Distributor at http://www.5speedTransmissions.com <http://www.5speedtransmissions.com/> Team Chevelle member #1778 (Gold), ACES member #1377 Hoosier State Chevelle Assoc (http://www.IndianaChevelles.com <http://www.indianachevelles.com/> ) #6 Malibu wrote: Video of a cylinder firing. This is pretty neat. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5815350492893860613 <http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5815350492893860613&hl=en> &hl=en _____ Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.488 / Virus Database: 269.13.37/1042 - Release Date: 10/1/2007 6:59 PM _____ Email and AIM finally together. 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