[NTLUG:Discuss] what is the best Linux web page developing tool?

[A.L.Lambert]

> Where dreamweaver and other gui tools shine is in layout.  I can turn
> out many, many more pages with different layouts with dreamweaver,
> than I could with a text editor in a similar amount of time.
>
> Perhaps if your idea of web design is to settle for a simple layout in
> the interest of simplicity itself, this would be ok.  Good web design
> uses layout aesthetically as well as to simplify functionality.  

	I do like relatively simple design in my webpages, in that I avoid
browser-specifc tags/features, I avoid excessive use of graphics that
makes for slow loading pages, and I avoid making overly complicated
layouts that take 10 minutes to figure out for the end user.  However, I
use every trick in the book to make nice layouts, from <TABLE>'s to give
me exacting control of element placement, to cascading style sheets (CSS)
to modernize the look and feel of a site.

	I really have no complaints with Dreamweaver and similar products,
other than they tend to produce really crappy HTML, that doesn't render
across multiple browsers correctly, and frequently makes use of
browser-specific tags/features.  It takes _me_ longer to clean up the mess
they make, than it does to hammer out a nice template design by hand.

> Anyone familiar with a good gui tool like Dreamweaver knows that it is
> ludicrous to say that any old text editor can come remotely close to
> it in laying out designs in reasonable timeframes.

	I don't disagree that you can probably crank up Dreamweaver,
select a basic theme/template, make some quick modifications to suit your
tastes, and have a site layout faster than I probaby could with my fingers
and a text editor starting from scratch.  However, I have at my disposal,
years of work in cool/spiffy templates, which with about 15 minutes at the
text editor, and a quick run of one of my 4 line 'sitegen.sh' scripts, I
can turn out cool HTML at a breakneck pace without GUI tools at all.  
And, I have no doubt whatsoever that I can write better HTML than any GUI
tool ever built. :)

> Caveat here:  I am a fast typist with an excellent grasp of HTML
> fundamentals and structured programming.  Admittedly, Dreamweaver is
> not good at providing structured HTML that is as good as what I would
> create by hand.  However, nothing's gonna stop me from pulling the
> generated HTML up in my trusty text editor and fixing the code --
> After the 42nd rapid fire layout design revision that day!

	Same here; although I use a totally different methodology. See my
comments in another message on SSI and a simple shell script to generate
an entire site (even thousands and thousands of pages if necessiary) in a
few seconds based on a new/modified template.shtml being used.

	Another tangent I used to use prior to my discovering SSI, was to
have a site-gen directory like this:

content/
head.html
foot.html
sitegen.sh

---cut sitegen.sh---

#!/bin/sh

for i in `/bin/ls content/` ; do

	cat head.html > public_html/$i
	cat content/$i >> public_html/$i
	cat foot.html >> public_html/$i
done
---cut---

	Which basically just punched in the text content of each page
where it needed to be, and the fancy HTML layout/design was handled in the
head.html and foot.html files.

	Anyway, I don't mean to argue with you at all, nor do I mean to
insult you for using a GUI tool to do page design; as with all things,
whatever works for you, cool.  Whatever works for me, cool.  They don't
have to be the same thing. :)  Cheers!

-- 
A.L.Lambert
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The problems that exist in the world today cannot be solved by the level
of thinking that created them...
	-Einstein
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