Many people want to create their own web site, but don’t know where to start. There are a dizzying array of Web site creation software products. You no longer have to code your site by hand in Notepad, but you still need to create a Web site that is compatible across operating systems and browsers. This article looks at three popular programs so you know about a few options before you go shopping.
Front Page
Many people already have FrontPage, whether they know it or not. If you have Microsoft Office, you may already have a copy of Front Page lying around on a CD somewhere. One of Front Page 2002’s main advantages is that it looks like the rest of Microsoft Office. If you are used to using Office programs like Excel and Word, you may feel right at home
with Front Page because many of its commands are similar or exactly the same as the ones you’d use in other Office programs. For example, if you want to put your company logo on your Web site’s home page, you choose Insert|Picture the same way you would if you were using Microsoft Word. To change a font, you just highlight the text and click the appropriate button on the Formatting toolbar. Magically, the text changes.
Like PowerPoint and Word, Front Page uses different views to help you work with your site. Normal view is much like Word’s Page View; it shows you a WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) view of the page you are working on. Another view lets you check out the HTML code behind the scenes or preview the page in a browser. Other views let you see your folder hierarchy and the navigation.
Unlike previous versions, by default, Front Page 2002 now does not reformat existing HTML code. This change is important if you are working with a programmer. In the past, any programming code or HTML FrontPage didn’t “understand” would get changed or thrown out, generally destroying it.
One thing to consider if you decide to use FrontPage is that when you publish your site, you need to be sure to work with an Internet Service Provider (ISP) that has the most recent version of the Microsoft FrontPage Server Extensions or SharePoint Team Services. Without the server extensions, many features do not work, such as form handlers, search forms, and hit counters. Some ISPs are adamant in their dislike of FrontPage, so be sure to find one who is agreeable before you attempt to publish your site.
FrontPage
Adobe GoLive
People who use Adobe products such as Illustrator and Photoshop will like Adobe Go Live because of its integration with other Adobe products. Just as FrontPage behaves much like the rest of Microsoft’s Office, Adobe GoLive functions much like other Adobe products and is designed to work well with them. For example, the new version of GoLive features auto-optimization, which uses Photoshop technology to automatically resize and optimize native Photoshop PSD files. It also lets you drag-and-drop Photoshop, Illustrator and LiveMotion files, so you can edit the source files within GoLive.
Adobe GoLive is a little more difficult to use than FrontPage. The software’s target audience is designers, so it has more of a learning curve. To use the program, you drag and drop objects onto the page and then modify their settings using the context-sensitive dialog boxes. There are a lot of settings, and to make intelligent choices, it really helps to understand how they affect the underlying HTML code.
If you like the approach Adobe software uses, you’ll have no problem picking up the nuances of GoLive. However, if you find Photoshop confusing, you may not enjoy the similar interface found in GoLive. User interface preference is a personal thing, so it helps to try before you buy if at all possible.
Adobe GoLive
Dreamweaver
Macromedia Dreamweaver is a somewhat high-end program that is really geared toward Web developers. It assumes that you already have a fair amount of background knowledge on creating Web sites and understand issues such as Web-safe colors, browser compatibility, and so on.
If you have a basic understanding of HTML, spending time in Dreamweaver is a good way to learn a lot more and extend your knowledge to advanced features like cascading style sheets and complex table formatting and layering. Dreamweaver offers excellent documentation with the package, including an online HTML reference, so you can learn what all the tags and their attributes do. With the split code and design view, you can see exactly what your various activities do to the HTML code on a page.
With Dreamweaver, you can create extremely simple sites that are compatible with virtually every browser, or highly complex sites that are Flash and Javascript-enabled. It’s up to you. Like Front Page, Dreamweaver also can be set to leave existing code alone, so pages with programming code in them will not be damaged when they are brought into and saved from within Dreamweaver.
Dreamweaver lets you check your files to see if they work in certain browsers, going back to version 2 of Netscape and Internet Explorer. You click Browser Check and select the target browser. Dreamweaver then generates a page that shows you which tags are not supported. This flexibility lets you create code that’s as compatible as you want it to be.
Because Dreamweaver is a professional-level Web design program, it includes a lot of features that help you use it in a workgroup, such as file check in and check out. Dreamweaver also lets you set up your own template files with editable and locked regions, so you can keep a consistent layout across pages. Another helpful feature is the library where you can save page elements that you want to reuse later.
Macromedia Dreamweaver
Web site creation tools have matured over the last several years, but it still helps to have at least some knowledge of HTML. The best place to learn about the Web is on the Web. Check out some of the free tutorials online and start learning. With a little time and effort, you’ll be able to create a great Web site.