Free or Open Source Web Design Program? 108
TheZorch asks: "I'm looking for a good Freeware or Open Source web design program. Right now, I use Web Dwarf but its features are a little limited. I love the ability to put text and graphics wherever I want, which is also how Dreamweaver works. The main problem with Web Dwarf is that I can't insert Macromedia Flash items onto a web page. I've tried Mozilla's web page composer, FrontPage Express, and OpenOffice. None give me the freedom to do what I want to be able to do. The program has to be FREE, no adware, no turned off features until you buy it, and I have to be able to format the page freestyle similar to how Dreamweaver and Web Dwarf work. Can you recommend one for me?"
best tool (Score:5, Funny)
vim
Re:best tool (Score:1)
NVU btw isn't that bad either however if you MUST have a wysiwyg editor.
Re:best tool (Score:4, Informative)
Eric
Invisible Fence Guide [ericgiguere.com] (CSS to make it fancy is still coming...)
Re:best tool (Score:4, Informative)
That said, I highly recommend you try it, hopefully it's limitations aren't specific to your application. nVu is somewhat patchy, so some users may have everything they need, while others (like me), can't do a thing (the re-write code thing is HUGE)
Re:best tool (Score:4, Informative)
Of course, because it's an actively-supported open source project, there's always hope that these bugs will be fixed over time. (Well, not sure about the file-oriented nature, that seems architectural... not that it's necessarily bad, I actually like working that way...)
Nvu is particularly excellent for someone just getting started with building web pages, which is why I recommended its use in my book. And the price is right for most people!
Eric
Re:best tool (Score:2)
emacs!
</troll>
--LWM
Re:best tool (Score:1)
Re:best tool (Score:2)
Am I the ONLY person in the world that uses pico/nano DAILY?
It's notepad for me!
Lets me search, cut, paste, has line numbers... and when using putty I can copy/paste even better. (hmm, better copy... yeah, that's accurate)
Re:best tool (Score:2)
Yes you are. You're also a weenie.
Re:best tool (Score:2)
Re:best tool (Score:2)
Re:best tool (Score:2)
Re:best tool (Score:1)
Bugger it says I, nano is one of the first things that gets installed onto my machines
Re:best tool (Score:2)
The only issue I ever run into is nano can't handle the number pad on the keyboard. At least not over putty. I get "[ NumLock glitch detected. Keypad will malfunction with NumLock off ]" and it won't type numbers. Pico has no problems with the number pad.
Re:best tool (Score:1)
Despite how funny the parent post has been mod'ed, Vim, and Emacs as well, become very powerful when used on a very regular basis; there is just so much more that can be done with keyboard shortcuts and macros (macros set up via keyboard input and not openning window after window and then typing something in). In fact, just this morning I literally saved myself thousands of keystrokes by using Vim macros on a project of mine.
Especially if your job depends on it like it can with *nix webserver support a
netbeans it (Score:1)
Re:netbeans it (Score:2, Informative)
That, and I want a pony too. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:That, and I want a pony too. (Score:2)
Re:That, and I want a pony too. (Score:2)
Re:That, and I want a pony too. (Score:3, Insightful)
While I think OSS is a great thing as it offers more choices, but I simply don't think it is necessarily capable of solving all problems in the best possible way.
Re:That, and I want a pony too. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:That, and I want a pony too. (Score:1)
Ah, situational ethics.
Sorry, folks; if it's immoral, it's always immoral. You may decide to do something immoral when you think it's justified, but it's still immoral. Killing is immoral. Killing someone who is trying to blow up a busload of children is immoral, but (in my worldview, anyway) justified. If you find closed-source software immoral, fine. That's your right, and I respect
Re:That, and I want a pony too. (Score:2)
Re:That, and I want a pony too. (Score:2)
Buying closed source software is IMMORAL?!?! I've just gotta hear the reasoning behind that...
I have a very hard time believing that I'm going to burn in hell for eternity as a result of stopping by CompUSA and picking up a copy of Quicken.
Re:That, and I want a pony too. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:That, and I want a pony too. (Score:1)
That would be money.
Re:That, and I want a pony too. (Score:3, Informative)
I was worried for a moment but I believe you mean constraint.
New rule (Score:3, Insightful)
As other posters pointed out, you can't realistically expect a $0 program to be equivalent to a $1000 program. You have to be willing to give something up. Sometimes if you've contributed to the communit
Re:New rule (Score:3, Insightful)
“As other posters pointed out, you can't realistically expect a $0 program to be equivalent to a $1000 program.”
“Equivalent” is too tricky a word to argue with, but Apache and Linux easily compete with $1000 products.
Re:New rule (Score:2)
bluefish and nvu (Score:4, Informative)
bluefish [openoffice.nl] which is available for MacOSX [darwinports.com]
and nvu [nvu.com] which is also available for MacOSX [darwinports.com].
Re:bluefish and nvu (Score:3, Funny)
re: your sig, THANKS! Abortion pictures are cool. Makes me want toast for dunking.
Re:bluefish and nvu (Score:1)
NVU is a good ope
Re:bluefish and nvu (Score:2, Informative)
What you really want is... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:bluefish and nvu (Score:1)
I'd recommend (in this order), a good text editor, a wysiawyg thingy like nvu for basic templating and testing, and using the view source facility of a browser to plagiarise^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H get ideas from other websites.
Excessively integrated tools are over rated in my opinion.
Re:OT: sig comment (Score:1)
This seemed like the simplest way to make a response WITHOUT forcing lots of people who would be totally uninterested from reading it (more so than any of the methods of response you mentioned).
Read my other posts if you want; I'm no troll. Trolling means *trying* to waste people's time (by writing intentionally "misguided" opinions, etc), and flamebaiting means *trying* to get other posters
Re:bluefish and nvu (Score:2)
I agree with you. The parent's poster had compiled and presented information pertinent to the OP's request. Unlike the twats who were belittling him.
What he had in his sig is his business. It is not as if he was hiding porn or anything else offensive behind a misl
Re:um (Score:3, Insightful)
Perhaps he doesn't want free/open source for ideological reasons. Maybe he's just cheap, broke or both! Maybe he was using dreamweaver with Crossover Office.
Whatever it may be, he has his reasons. Why not obstain if you have nothing useful to say.
Re:um (Score:1)
If everyone took this advice then Slashdot would see their posts cut by 90% =P
No, instead you would see a metawar over... (Score:2)
Re:um (Score:2)
Re:um (Score:2)
I earn my living from writing commercial systems and software. In doing this I use both commercial and OS software. I have also produced code that I've released as OS and PD.
This is the real world and there are lots of reasons, choices and options. There is nothing wrong with wanting to use free/Open Source sw on an proprietory OS. Esp if it is an OS that is so pervasive as to
What OS are you using? (Score:2)
What Operating System are you using? This makes a big difference... there are dozens of free/OSS web development apps for Linux, but there are only a handful which run on Windows. Not sure about MacOSX.
You mentioned "Frontpage", so presumably you are running on Windows. But you need to be more clear.
it has to be said... (Score:4, Interesting)
Hrm - sounds like vim [vim.org] would be the ticket.
All joking aside - my understanding of html/css has shot up through the roof since I ditched Dreamweaver and started coding by hand. Code cleanliness has also improved greatly, as you'd expect. If you've never tried, give yourself a week with a text editor and a good html/css book. It's quite freeing to not have to worry about anything other than the code. No application updates, no program idiosyncracies to deal with, etc.
Re:it has to be said... (Score:2)
--LWM
Re:it has to be said... (Score:3, Informative)
A Survey of Open Source Web Development Tools (Score:3, Informative)
With Links (Score:5, Informative)
Linux.com ran a story about web development tools. [linux.com]They approach it as "web development tools for Linux," but most are available for win32 and OS X. I have almost no experience with commercial web development tools (except when trying to tidy up their ugly code). I use content management systems/wikis/etc. where possible (so others can add content & no one need worry about the code or an editor) & a text editor () when not. That being said, [vim.org]Bluefish, [openoffice.nl] Quanta, [sourceforge.net] and Nvu [nvu.com] are all nice. All of these options are discussed in the article, as is Screem, [screem.org] which I haven't seen first-hand.
Re:A Survey of Open Source Web Development Tools (Score:1)
nvu (Score:3, Informative)
Do you NEED Flash? (Score:4, Informative)
You say that like it's a problem.
I know, I know, I've got that "I know what's best" attitude that everybody loves to hate, but really, Flash is a craptastic piece of software, known mainly for bloating download times, making it impossible to bookmark a specific page, and generally being annoying. ("Punch the fucking idiotic monkey and win a piece of spyware!") Not to mention that it OWNZ0RZ screen-readers that blind or nearly-blind people use.
Seriously re-evaluate your requirements. Do you really *NEED* Flash?
-paul
Re:Do you NEED Flash? (Score:1)
Re:Do you NEED Flash? (Score:5, Insightful)
Businesses that have Flash-based websites with no non-Flash option usually lose my business. I won't even stick around to see the sales pitch. I'll go find a competitor who didn't start their relationship with me by annoying me with some animation-rich but content-deprived piece of self-absorbed fluff.
Flash is for Homestar Runner, not overdesigned menu sets and half-implmeneted-and-mostly-broken re-implementations of things that are already built into HTML such as the button and the scroll bar. It's a toy for web designers who think their primary job responsibility is mucking around with Flash, not making websites that don't suck.
Re:Do you NEED Flash? (Score:2, Informative)
It doesn't make useless sites workable, but if you just want to stop being annoyed by intrusive multimedia, there's a great solution [mozdev.org].
Re:Do you NEED Flash? (Score:1, Flamebait)
Mod Parent UP! (Score:2)
Re:Do you NEED Flash? (Score:2)
That is to say, Flash has a use, it's just not being used correctly in many cases. You could say the same about java. I mean, applets...hello? A 200k download to display a scrolling news bar?
Everything you describe is a symptom of poor design, not of the Flash environment. Sorry to say, but a little motion gets people's attention, and can be used to illustrate information that would otherwise be one-dimension
Re:Do you NEED Flash? (Score:1)
Also, if you were building a learning / online drawing program, or needed to include modules of a game, flash is going to do it better right now than DHTML, and probably it will be more supported by the browsers, eve
Re:Do you NEED Flash? (Score:1)
Re:Do you NEED Flash? (Score:2)
Re:Do you NEED Flash? (Score:1)
Sad about the non-Microsoft visitors though (Score:2)
Re:Do you NEED Flash? (Score:2)
Re:Do you NEED Flash? (Score:1)
Re:Do you NEED Flash? (Score:2)
That and for ending up with pages in which no less than seven separately moving, flashing, blinking, and twirling imagescan all dance around on your screen as each advertisement uses it.
You could cause an epileptic seizure with something like that. (No, I'm not kidding.)
Re:Do you NEED Flash? (Score:2)
Any webmonkey who lacks the intelligence and skill to say "Hrmm... this software won't let me place Flash on the page - maybe I should put in a filler image & then link in the Flash by hand later" shouldn't be allowed to use Flash in the first place.
Freeware (Score:3, Informative)
ASP.Net WebMatrix [asp.net]
I never used the thing beyond the first day I tried it, but some people may find it useful. I use text editors for all my serious web development.
Re:Freeware (Score:2)
On a related note, though, it has one of the best online helps/docs for the
Re:Freeware (Score:2)
As a professional website developer.. (Score:4, Informative)
I'd suggest Jedit for any platform with Java support, or HTML-Kit if you use Windows, and want some different features.
Handcoding is the way to go, in my opinion. You can supplement your work with IDEs such as dreamweaver, but do NOT rely on them. If you can't develop a website in an efficient manner by hand, you need practice.
Re:As a professional website developer.. (Score:1)
ASP.NET Web Matrix (Score:1)
http://www.asp.net/ [asp.net]
I use several (Score:2)
Learn to code by hand! (Score:2)
Of course, in the process, you may learn that what you're used to building is not how HTML should be written in the first place, but that's a whole other issue. Get over the idea that you can control exactly how it looks on everyone's screen. Ever
Re:Learn to code by hand! (Score:1)
emacs sgml-mode (Score:3, Interesting)
As for Flash: dump the old thing and embrace an SVG + XForms future...
Re:emacs sgml-mode (Score:2)
If only browser manufacturers would. As it stands, it seems to be a perpetual "future" just past the horizon.
Re:emacs sgml-mode (Score:2)
Be a professional (Score:2)
<elitism>
Re:Be a professional (Score:2, Insightful)
Are you serious? I can't remember the last time I sat down with a professional and had them open a terminal with VI or whatever. Professional web developers are hardly the static HTML page designers of the early 90's. Sure for a personal site, a couple pages, a text editor would work fine. But these days professionals develop code in PHP, ASP.NET, CFML and Java. Professionals write websites like Amazon, Google, MSN and CNN. These websites
Re:Be a professional (Score:1)
Re:Be a professional (Score:1)
Re:Be a professional (Score:2)
"Are YOU a PROFESSIONAL web developer?"
I like hand coding, I like the freedom it gives me. I like knowing that my code is properly 'generated' and conforming. I DONT like that it can take so long. I DONT like that it is easy to make bad mistakes. I DONT like having to wade through code to correct said mistakes after I've validated the code.
Yes, a PROFESSIONAL web developer should have the appropriate WebFu skills. Running dev teams I have no patience for alleged dev
Re:Be a professional (Score:1)
It's the same thing with professional web developers. I don't care what tools they use, as long as they *know* HTML, CSS, scripting, etc. But I've actually met "professional" web developers that didn't know HTML.
Re:Be a professional (Score:2)
I also have met alleged 'pros' who couldn't tell a tag from a headbut on the keyboard and have deep sixed more than a few when I've taken over the teams. I am rabit about W3C standards.
Your second paragraph of your reply was much more sensible and had you said it in the first place, I doubt you would have ha
You're a professional? (Score:3)
Welcome,R.
errr, what about Screem? (Score:2)
I know there's a linux emulator for windows but I forget the name.
ANyway, I remember it as being really quite nice to use, interface close to dreamweaver, but without the obvious proprietary integration of flash and all that Macromedia jazz. You can still include flash animations though, unless my memory is failing.
Hope this gives you a start.
Re:errr, what about Screem? (Score:2)
Re:HTML-Kit (Score:2)
stick with the editor/site manager you prefer and (Score:2)
Even in Dreamweaver it's not like you get a preview of your flash content... it shows you a grey box with the flash icon, not very useful for anything really, so what's the point? Flash itself exports all the html that you need for embedding your object and it does it better than any other tool.
So... just drop a jpeg comp of your flash object in the layout and do a find/replace when previ
Quanta! (Score:2)
Webmatrix? (Score:2)