Website building software

Big Mike · Oct 3, 2007

Can anyone recommend some website building software?

I'm just trying to build something rather simple and I though I could get away with something free/shareware...but I haven't had much luck.

I was thinking of FrontPage or Dreamweaver....but I'm not sure I want to spend that much on something I probably won't use very much.

Chris of Arabia · Oct 3, 2007

Take a look at Crimson Editor and Aptana.

The former is pretty much just a (very) sophisticated form of Notepad, but one that recognises and colour codes HTML, PHP, Java, BASIC, ASP syntax etc. I use this all the time for stuff and it's open on my desktop now.

Aptana does rather more and gets much nearer to what Dreamweaver does and will autocomplete HTML mark-up and JavaScript (which is it's real strength). If you check out the site, you'll find that future functionality will include the auto-complete & syntax checking for PHP and some other stuff too. It's an Open Source development, so it's free. I've not actually tried it yet, but it looks very promising and seems to have some very good write-ups.

Sideburns · Oct 3, 2007

NVu is like Dreamweaver, but it's free. (and portable)

Chris of Arabia · Oct 3, 2007

Also try The Open Source Alternative for ideas. Type in the big name application you'd like to match and see what options it comes up with.

gomexz · Oct 3, 2007

For the record I hate MS Front page. I had to use it when I did my High School's site. Currently for my site I am using Dream Weaver MX which would be my fav version. A friend of mine likes to use Kompozor. Which is an open source editor that is easy to use and free. You can find it here
http://www.kompozer.net/

Chris of Arabia · Oct 4, 2007

Did you find anything you liked the look of Mike?

Big Mike · Oct 4, 2007

I checked out Nvu...but the download didn't work. Kompozor is basically the same thing, so I tried that and it sucked.

The other day, I downloaded one that I liked, called BlueVoda. I built a few pages, only then to find out that you can't publish anything without signing up for web hosting from them.

Last night, I downloaded a trial version of a WYSIWYG editor from www.coffeecup.com and it's pretty good. I hear that their HTML editor is pretty good as well. They have many many sub programs for doing all sorts of things...and the problem is that you have to buy each separate application for what you want to. They do have a couple 'combo' deals where you can buy 8 or 9 of the programs in a bundle, for a decent price ($129). Although, I could probably find a version of Frontpage for close to that.

I'm trying CoffeeCup for a while, and I'll decide if I want to purchase it. It certainly seems to be much better than any of the free ones that I tried.

Keagle · Oct 4, 2007

Please don't get Frontpage. As it's Microsoft, the Frontpage code will work perfectly in IE6/7, but not as well in Firefox/Opera.

Big Mike · Oct 4, 2007

Advice noted, thanks.

gomexz · Oct 4, 2007

If u like BlueVoda. But if the program itself wont let u upload to your webserver. trying FTP'ing the webpages your self fromt he command prompt. It only takes a few simple commands.

Big Mike · Oct 4, 2007

I tried pasting the code into another editor but it wasn't working for some reason...some of the things showed up but many didn't.

gomexz · Oct 4, 2007

What i meant was when u save the pages you built you should be able to open it with I.E or Firefox. It should be just a basic .html file. U can upload the .html files from the command prompt your self with out even using the software. Im assuming you use windows. Lets say you saved your webpage files in "My Documents" you would go to start then RUN and in run you type cmd and press ok. a black box will appear. Then type cd "My Documents" once you are there. type ftp and then the IP address or hosting domain. and press enter it would prompt you for your username type it and press enter then type the password and enter. Then type put filename.html and enter. It will then upload the file for you. Which is what your software does for you. I hope that helped.

doenoe · Oct 4, 2007

cant you use flashfxp for that? You can find demo's of that on the web and it works for 30 days or something. After that you just uninstall and install again.
Think its a bit easier (though the cmd thing isnt really difficult to begin with

)

gomexz · Oct 4, 2007

Oh yea good point you can also use filzilla its free forever
http://filezilla-project.org/
and very easy to use.

Big Mike · Oct 4, 2007

What i meant was when u save the pages you built you should be able to open it with I.E or Firefox. It should be just a basic .html file. U can upload the .html files from the command prompt your self with out even using the software. Im assuming you use windows. Lets say you saved your webpage files in "My Documents" you would go to start then RUN and in run you type cmd and press ok. a black box will appear. Then type cd "My Documents" once you are there. type ftp and then the IP address or hosting domain. and press enter it would prompt you for your username type it and press enter then type the password and enter. Then type put filename.html and enter. It will then upload the file for you. Which is what your software does for you. I hope that helped.

No, they are saved in some sort of proprietary BlueVoda file type .bvd....or something like that...not HTML.