[megabyte]

I am told i need a html editor to alter part of my websites pages.

I have heard of some like Dreamweaver, but have seen others for just a few pounds some claiming that they are just as good as the expensive makes of software.....Very confusing !!

I dont want to build websites just do my small amount of editing........Do i need Dreamweaver ???....Are the others up to scratch ???.....Can i get by with one of these cheap ones off ebay for what i want to do??.....Any recommendations???

Thanks

[Hybr!d]

Crimson Editor is great for just code, it isn't WYSIWYG.

[serverguy]

You might want to look at Adobe Contribute

http://www.adobe.com/products/contribute/?xNav=WSCT

It is good if all you need to do is update.

Why not ask the person who has built the website what he recommends?

[dr john]

If all you wish to edit is the text, you can use ANY text editor.
TextPad is good, as is Notepad++
They also let you preview what you have done.

If you are not planning on anything more complex that changing the words, or adding a new paragraph, you don't need state of the art software like Dreamweaver.

BUT
Under no circumstances use FrontPage, it is a dreadful html editor.

PS Yes, all other html editors are up to it, UNLESS they are the sort that says "just drag and drop" or "just click and type" These ones use lots of absolute positioning, which can give you unexpected problems. Also NEVER use anything that says it can "also save as html" as these program tend to convert from some other format into html and make a mess of th ecode. EG Word, Excel, any desktop publish and the like should be avoided like the plague.

[megabyte]

Thanks all.

Today was looking at the stuff you recomended and ended up looking at Dreamweaver on ebay.

Idea of making my own sites easily with Dreamweaver really appeals to me but why 3 different versions of the same thing?? and why do they all say student version?? and which one would a proffesional use to make their websites??

[dr john]

Dreamweaver has been updated regularly over the years, so you might be seeing versions from different years, when the name changed slightly. The latest version is now branded Abode as they bought Macromedia.

Student versions are for students at colleges, so give them software at reasonable prices and get them hooked on it, so they hopefully perseude an employer to buy the software that they already know how to use. Student versions of most software are not cutdown versions, but often lack a printed manual.

A professional uses any version (although later versions are obviously better), as software doesn't make good websites, a professional's good mind, experience, skill, knowledge and insight does. I can make the same web site with Dreamweaver or TextPad or NotePad++ (and frequently use either one to edit them). Expensive software will NOT make you a web designer - a friend has just done his own site in DW and it is not very good at all, for example. Expensive software just makes it easier for you to do.

Be aware that some advertisers on eBay are trying to sell you KompoZer (but they call it CompoZer) which is a free WYSIWYG package, available from www.kompozer.net This is easy to use as well. And free. If you can't build a site in KompoZer, you'd really struggle with DW.
But you should learn about html and css to make things easier. Much easier. Especially when you come asking for help.

PS Contribute is for the case where a designer builds pages and other staff edit the content, usually office staff just typing in stuff. Or people from several different departments edit their own section of the site.

PPS Avoid really old versions of DW like DW3 (I've got a copy myself). It creates bad code that can be hard to update by hand. And it has little idea about how to display floats, unlike KompoZer.

[megabyte]

Thanks Dr John and what you say makes good sense.

[MySlowQuietLife]

Im complety with Dr john when it comes to Dreamweaver only making things easy for you BUT does it?
when i started creating web pages using Dreamweaver i was using the html editor + the split screen so i could add div tags and table objects directly into the page . This dreamweaver didnt like as it adds lots of code ontop of each other until its a big mess.

i had multiple clasess in a row such as
<p class="bold"><p class="italic">content</p>

this did not please me as at times it used the div1 or the div2 (not sure why).

When you then read through the code (and especialy if your learning) it gives you a very bad idea of how the script is meant to look and work.

My advice if your learning use notepad++ it easy to use and lets you prieview what you have done (yes you can do that anyway with notepad but it takes less time) it also has script fix and you can choose the language that you are wrighting in + it has quite a feiw patch downloads.

Hope i made sense.

[mrdaveyk]

i use dreamweaver, find it very easy

[tvbusinesslounge]

Choosing editor depends on some factors ... how you like to code or design, what's your skill level, what's your budget for buying paid editors ... etc.

Here is some editors

Adobe Dreamweaver
Waterproof PHPEdit
NuSphere
PHPEd
Notepad++
Editpro++
Comodo Editor
Zend Editor

Search your editor from here http://www.php-editors.com/ according to your requirements.