Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

What was Apple thinking?? That was the question I asked myself when an
older friend of mine (a true progressive I tell yah; she has Parkinsons and
she is not slowing down at all) asked me to help her upload a website she
needed to promote her photography collection which she intended to
have on display at an upcoming art show in January. First of all, the idea
of using only Mac-created templates, that were so rigid in design that you
had no other options, is absolutely absurd. You have no choice but to
give up and realize that you just completely wasted your $79.99 (Hey,
Steve Jobs, the old lady wants her money back!!!) Who would have
thought, with the success of the iPod and iMac lines of products, that
iWeb would be so disappointing. One would have thought iWeb was
going to be Apple`s answer to Adobe`s golive and dreamweaver. But, with
no room for integration with other languages, no forms, no room for
personal creativity in terms of design (you have only Mac templates) and
strict server options (you need a .mac account to use iWeb and you can`t
easily store it on another server of your choice using ftp), iWeb is nothing
more than a waste of hard drive space. To try to figure out what
possessed Apple to distribute the product, I went to the Mac store in La
Jolla, CA. I asked one of the fine Mac store agents how exactly to get
around using the software and he told me that Apple is still
experimenting with iWeb and that better versions will come out later. At
which point i thought to myself, "Keep that s**t in your lab. until it has
some use to the general public." In conclusion, my personal verdict--
iWeb is definitely an iNot for web designers!!!    


-------------------------

folaolumofin.com web design studios

Microsoft is well known for releasing Beta versions to the public and calling them finished products. Look at Windows 95, for example, which was only a beta version for Windows 98. Then look at Windows 98SE, which was the main "patch" for Win98. Same with Windows 2000 being the beta version of Windows XP, and "Vista" being the patch.

Now that Microsoft is involved with Apple, it stands to reason the same philosophy would apply. Hell, Windows 3.0 was a rushed-to-market beta version of OS/2, when it all comes down to the bottom line.

Many tech people never use a 1.0 version, assuming it`s really only a glorified beta release. In this case of iWeb, I`d assume that a bad product won`t even get beyond that first version. But I wonder if it`s Apple, or if it`s a creeping new way of doing business across many coporations these days.

Webmaster77,
I am not familiar with iweb, so I can`t really give you my opinion on it, but come on, between us two... Nothing can ever replace Dreamweaver Studio 8. As for Golive? I don`t know.... I wouldn`t bother with it. To me it seems like the Frontpage of Adobe.
I have tried many tools to get the job done. I have even designed a whole web site using notepad.[I`m a coder] and I prefer to use the code view even when I work in Dreamweaver... Why you may ask? I like to be in control... I like to make sure my code is clean and most of the time I build websites by using Cascading Stylesheets and divisions. Not to big on Tables, unless Im going to make a form or something that needs to have some structure added to it.
What posessed you to use iweb, I don`t know, but yeah get your money back.
Go with something more user friendly..

 

-------------------------

Edgar Monroy
Web Developer / Owner / Consultant
When starting your own business the need to "know-how" is greater than money!
http://www.nuevolution.net

Which, IMHO, is why Adobe bought out Macromedia to get Dreamweaver and the rest of the Macromedia lineup--their own software was creating code-heavy [ahem] while Macromedia`s offered the coder full control if they wanted it.

I tend to do most of my work in the code as well... basic layout I`ll do in design view with Dreamweaver, but for the rest I end up in the code. I can`t help myself...

I guess I may be a heretic in the website design world, but here`s a confession: I`ve never been all that impressed with Dreamweaver. GoLive doesn`t exactly knock my socks off either.

But for the fact that it seemed to default to <BIG LETTERS FOR THE TAGS>, I thought that HoTMetaL was a good editor. Alas, it seems to have faded away.

The best thing I`ve found for Web Standards-based coding is TopStyle, but be forewarned: You`d best enjoy coding at the "raw code" level.


-------------------------

Design & Consulting | | Water Harvesting

I`ve always been a big fan of Macromedia Dreamweaver (MX).  When you customize the program preferences, it writes very clean code code.

I believe it ultimately comes down to personal preference when choosing an HTML editor.  I`ve been using Dreamweaver for so long that I know the interface extremely well.  Whereas our web developer, Kathleen, prefers Homesite since that is what she`s used for many years.

We do all our coding by hand, so "design" views don`t play a large role. 

-------------------------

Brian Cleveland,
Web Producer,
StartupNation

Postcarder,

It seems to me that the problem that you where having with your <TAGS> was a simple adjustment in your preferences. Now as for HOMESITE, I love that program, few people use it but its results are remarkable. I use it more now since Dreamweaver 8 seems to have a bug when you use Coldfusion Validation tools. As much as I want to Develop a Full Site in Dreamweaver, Currently I am stepping away from it until they fix the bug. But I still rely on it to get most of the site up.
As a matter a fact let me share with you a web site I am close to completing this was created using Flash Dreamweaver and Homesite. http://www.sunnysunglasses.com
Give me feed back please..

-------------------------

Edgar Monroy
Web Developer / Owner / Consultant
When starting your own business the need to "know-how" is greater than money!
http://www.nuevolution.net

Nice visuals, but the link type is too small for my aging eyes. It`s also not a good idea to put your link type in a graphic. Makes it too difficult for search engines to follow it.

-------------------------

Design & Consulting | | Water Harvesting

iWeb is a glorified blogging/consumer tool and never was pushed as anything but, just like the iLife suite is.

Sometimes, you can adapt iLife apps for pro use (iPhoto can be handy for things), but if you`re a serious video editor you need Final Cut Express or Final Cut Pro, if you do serious graphic work you need Photoshop.  If you`re serious about web work, use Dreamweaver.

I`m sure iWeb will get better - but it is and always will be designed for home use.  As part of the iLife suite though, a pretty good deal.  For that $79.99 you got iWeb, iPhoto, iMovie, Garageband, and iDVD.  So really, not so much of a ripoff.  You can`t expect too much from what amounts to a $16 program vs. a tool like Dreamweaver that is $299 (I`d recommend getting the whole studio suite for $999 though).

As to SunnySunglasses - I like the simplicity, the colors are well-suited and match well.

Bring those load times down..  I`m waiting forever for the catalog on a broadband connection.  Is there any way you can preload only a portion so I start using it and have the rest of the load work in the background?  It`s also a little odd in that when I click the preload bar, I get a pdf.

A big thing about Flash usability is to enable the back button, you can do it with actionscript, especially if you`re going to have an all-flash site with lots of content.  You probably know the product links don`t work yet and open to another window.


-------------------------

"It`s not work, it`s network!"

Portage Media Solutions
http://www.portagemedia.com
My Blog: http://www.interactivemediatips.com

No products are still in process.
Those will feed off Coldfusion and MYSQL database.
Thats for the input, on the preloaders, I`m still working on the flash and xml files. I will give you guys a heads up once I completed the whole web site.
I know the font is hard to see, It was the customers idea to target the teen market.. Why? I guess they have their reasons...


-------------------------

Edgar Monroy
Web Developer / Owner / Consultant
When starting your own business the need to "know-how" is greater than money!
http://www.nuevolution.net