What do you use to create your site?

[donecweb]

A lot of people use something like notepad to write the code for their sites but it is not necessary. There are many different WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) programs out there that work quite well. Below is a review of 25 of them some are free and some are proprietary and cost a lot of money. Check it out and if you have any questions maybe someone here will have an answer. I have used several of the free ones.
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/05/06/25-wysiwyg-editors-reviewed/

[Menard]

I have primarily been using notepad but as of late I have been looking into HTML editors again.

Many of my favorites are long in the tooth (pretty old) by now.

EasyHTML (freeware) used to be my standard editor. It had been a while since it was updated and with later JavaScript code I would get script errors on refreshing the preview; to the pint of annoyance, so I gave up using it. EasyHTML was updated in 2005, and I didn't know it, but was eager to try it when I found out. It would have been perfect except that I was getting a memory leak when using the program, eventually bringing my computer to a near standstill. Dangit; like I said, it would have been so perfect if it had not been for the memory leak.

HotDog Pro (paid) is what set the standard for what I wanted in an editor, and which EasyHTML pretty much matched with the update; except for that memory leak thing. Two features I particularly like with HotDog are a split screen preview and a drop down menu to which you can add links to external programs you use. Maybe those might seem trivial, but both made coding more convenient.

Beerwin's PlainHTML is an editor (freeware) I have recently installed and am looking forward to getting into it. I remember this editor from a few years ago, was impressed then, though it didn't offer some things I wanted, but boy has it been updated. The download itself is 39MB and it has a shopping list of features of which some if not many paid editors are lacking.


Other mentions:

Alleycode is freeware and development has ceased but it does offer a handy and free choice with a split screen preview, easy tag insertion, a table builder, and other features. Unfortunately it does not handle div scrollers well in its preview and as I use div scrollers more frequently now, I don't have much use for it.

Selida (amazingly mentioned in that article) is an old standby freeware editor offering both a wysiwyg editor and code editor, with a split screen preview. It is older than what they allude in the article (they say it hasn't been updated since 2005; I don't think it has been updated since 2001).

Lambda HTML Editor is a simple, small, and fast freeware editor if someone wants something lightweight which is primarily a code editor with a few extra features like tag insertion and special character insertion.

JetSoft HTML editor is a freeware editor which is rather light on features but does offer a small editor with a split screen preview for someone who needs such.

DFM2HTML is a wysiwyg editor, freeware, which comes with near 40 built in templates, and the author seems pretty dedicated to it; it now being in version 4.0 and growing with each version.

[Andy]

I hate to see Windows NotePad being mentioned when NotePad++ is so much better.

For example, you can search all the files in a directory branch for your search string and this editor syntax-highlights your code. It will save you so much time. And you can drag and drop files onto this application to open them up.

But, it is not an HTML WYSIWYG editor!

[stu]

Hi

I use to use notpad ++ then i went to html kit which i thought was great, now i use dreamweaver cs4, its quick ans simple, i carnt stand the page builder side of it but as a text editor its great as it ends the closing tags for you, sorry getting lazy in my old age

[Andy]

It can be difficult to make an attractive website without using a CMS (Content Management System such as WordPress) since these come with designer-created themes. But one work-around might be to adapt a theme by removing the CMS-specific code (but of course retain the credits to the designer).

So where I build a site that needs to look good, I tend to use a CMS plus ready-made theme so that's another reason I can get away with using NotePad++. But most times I focus on the SEO so the appearance is not so important since the visitor will be leaving soon to buy something after landing on the site, hopefully.

If you can justify the cost, then DreamWeaver seems to be the #1 choice for WYSIWYG editing.

[stu]

Ya i agree with you about the cost of dreamweaver, i got it very cheap via an offer with studend discount, other wise i would still be using html kit which is open source.

I did like html kit its an advanced notpad ++ with validation built in

[Andy]

I used to recommend HTML kit here years ago, and I still think it is a great piece of software. But now I am so familiar with HTML and CSS etc. I don't seem to need it any more.

[stu]

Hi

I dont to be honest, I like dreamweaver for lazyness realy, when you go to close a tag it automaticly closes it for you, so less typing

[donecweb]

Stu does dreamweaver do CSS?

[stu]

Hi

yes it does do css, and javascript, its pretty good for that it does you mouse over image scripts for you and things like that, i use the cs4 version which has plenty of extras agaist the cs3 version so if you are gona buy defo spend the extra and get the c34, i have the complete adobe master collection cs4 i also got coldfusion to run on my pc aswell but stay away from that

[donecweb]

I wouldn't use dreamweaver myself because I prefer freeware and I have found enough free software to do all the stuff I so far have found a need for. I was just wondering. Does dreamweaver write any extra code when using the WISIWYG function?

[stu]

Hi

I dont know if cs4 does i now cs3 i trype the code in direct

[Andy]

Way to go with the signature links Stu.

[Andy]

I used WordPress again for a new site since it is so quick and easy to set up without the hassle of designing a site.

Here's a page from the site that I created today:

How Private Investors Are Screwed

I used my WP Tycoon script to create the site in about 12 seconds and then I just needed to select a template and create a couple of posts.

[nsterling]

I use dreamweaver to code programs which is the PHP. I find it easy to navigate and to use.