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Development Website Design 'ToolKit'?

Discussion in 'Software' started by G-gnome, 5 Nov 2003.

  1. G-gnome

    G-gnome Peter Dickison

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    Time has come for me to build myself a website and I thought the best place to start for some advice would be here. I have looked around online and every tom dick and harry says one thing or another so I'm just getting confused. From the highbrow stuff talked about in here I hope you guys will be able to help with my simple request. Here goes:


    I am hoping to build a collection of development tools to enable me (as a novice) to design, upload and maintain a simple website that displays the usual sorts of things (for a personal modding site) - bio, project logs, case gallery, photographic work gallery, contact details, links to favourite sites (like bit-tech ;) )etc. i.e. basic pages containing information and pics about my work, etc :D .


    So far I have Macromedia Dreamweaver, Photoshop, Illustrator, Flash (though I haven't a clue about using flash) and the MS Office suite (frontpage etc). I have also registered .com and .net domain names.


    What I am hoping for is advice (in dumb laymans terms) on where to go from here e.g. "edit images with XXX, do your text and layout with XXX, upload like this with XXX and use XXX to update the site etc etc.). Any linkage to simple step-by-step online resources would be much appreciated as well. I seek the truth gentlemen!

    :cooldude:


    I haven't got a host sorted yet so anyone knows of a good reliable (and cheap) host with decent bandwidth? My first project seems to have drawn a bit of attention and as a loyal bit-staffer (and to stop my poor wee site being squashed) I'll be trying to focus most traffic to bit-tech - I do feel I need a small personal space though to show off other interests (and potential income earners such as my photography) as well as case-modding projects.


    I have seen Linears site,mashies site and crimson sky's site and like that sort of thing (I'd do different graphic design but I'd like to do a similar structure). Mashie's site in particular appeals to me. I'm hoping with dreamweaver and any other tools, software, advice and guides you gents show me I will be able to make something similar?


    Anyway, I hope you can assist a novice. I'd love to get good at designing websites and get to know a lot about the whole process - I hope to do some nightschool in it someday.

    Many thanks. :)
     
  2. simon w

    simon w What's a Dremel?

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    First off - do yourself a big favour and burn your Frontpage CD

    Here's my list of s/w
    Dreamweaver MX 2004
    Photoshop/ImageReady CS
    Textpad 4.71 (Manually writing code)
    FlashFXP (For when I don't wanna use DW's built-in ftp)
    Adobe 6 Pro
    WinRAR
    Mozilla/Firebird (for testing)

    And http://validator.w3.org for checking my coding

    Use photoshop for still images, ImageReady for animated gifs & basic flash stuff

    I like to write my code myself, so I just use DW to produce the layout and TextPad to write (X)HTML/ASP/PHP

    DW will upload your work for you

    urls:
    www.htmlgoodies.com
    www.aspin.com
    www.phpbuilder.com

    Personaly, I use www.krystalhosting.co.uk. It may not be the cheapest, but you get what you pay for, and krystal's support is cool - you can talk to their techies almost 24/7 via MSN :thumb:
     
  3. djengiz

    djengiz Pointless.

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    Dear G-GNOME,
    You might want to try Macromedia Homesite 5.5 . It is a great code editor also for webprojects. UltraEdit is also a very good editor.
     
  4. Hwulex

    Hwulex Minimodder

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    Nah, Textpad pwns. :thumb:
     
  5. simon w

    simon w What's a Dremel?

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    Indeed :rock: :cooldude:
     
  6. G-gnome

    G-gnome Peter Dickison

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    Thanks fellas! I'll start looking at some of those links.

    Cheers

    :)
     
  7. penski

    penski BodMod

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    I'd say ignore the pretentious 'I'm so leet I use notepad and MS paint' things and grab a copy of Dreamweaver. :)

    *n
     
  8. Hwulex

    Hwulex Minimodder

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    :eyebrow:

    Each to their own I suppose. I much prefer writing all the code myself rather than have something generate it for me. I know exactly what everthing is then, and where it goes.
    Textpad, and similar editors, make coding much much easier thanks to syntax highlighting and the likes.

    Combine that with Photoshop (my preferred graphics app) and you're cooking with gas. :D
     
  9. djengiz

    djengiz Pointless.

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    I agree with Hwulex. I like to code everything myself too. But I do use tools for syntax highlighting. Coding gets a bit easier.
     
  10. OneSeventeen

    OneSeventeen Oooh Shiny!

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    Just my two cents:
    combine a color-coded text editor with an ftp client, link checker, code cleaner, code formatter, preview window and an optional code tipping system and you've got dreamweaver.

    I start typing $_ and it gives me a quick list of items beginning with $_ by the time I type $_P I can hit enter and it spits out $_POST[ ready for me to fill in the rest.

    plus if I type in something like imagettftext( I get a popup below my cursor that reads:
    (int im, int size, int angle, int x, int y, int col, string fontfile, string text)

    so I know what to type next, as I type items in, the list gets smaller and smaller, showing me what to type next.

    Kind of like using a straight edge when drawing, I'm still writing the code, I've just a guide to help avoid obvious mistakes.

    So my advice would be, if you've already got dreamweaver, use it! If you don't have dreamweaver, there are tons of great text editors, I agree. Most of all, find out what you like, if you don't like dreamweaver, don't use it, but you may want to make a few simple pages in different editors and find out what works for you.
     
  11. pranks7er

    pranks7er mange tout

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  12. Sid

    Sid Banned

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    While dreamweaver can save time, it's pretty much necessary to understand a fair amount of HTML. It's an easy language and won't take long to learn. Coding and editing in a text editor gives you much more control.
     
  13. ChillingSP

    ChillingSP What's a Dremel?

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    My opinion.
    You may use dreamweaver as it can save you from hours of coding.
    However you should study html so you can add/modify the source DW creates for you.
    Use the power but understand it as well :D
     
  14. pranks7er

    pranks7er mange tout

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    html buy a book and go through it
     
  15. RTT

    RTT #parp

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    wasted cash :)
     
  16. complexprocess

    complexprocess What's a Dremel?

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    I use dreamweaver for the quick and dirty stuff, but I find that it doesn't do the trick for me if I want standard compliant, streamlined code. I end up spending almost as much time fixing the code it generates as I would have just coding a template from scratch. Admittedly I haven't tried Dreamweaver MX, which may generate better code. I haven't heard one way or the other.

    So yeah, the moral of the story is one way or the other you should learn HTML, and there's no better way to learn than by messing around with it. :)

    As for hosting, why not talk to Monolith? He hosts bit-tech and is 'the man with the golden bandwidth" as they say. Maybe he has servers set up for shared hosting.
     
  17. G-gnome

    G-gnome Peter Dickison

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    Wow so many replies.

    Thanks very much for all the advice. I can use DW MX (and the rest of the macromedia suite) at work so I'll go with that and photoshop, but, I'll definitely be learning as much html as possible. Already when playing around in DW I have the code window open as well and do some editing in there - I like to see how it works ;)

    Pranks7er - like your site mate, looks very swish :)

    I found out today that an IS guy at work has an interactive learning cd that he got when he was doing his Dreamweaver/Flash etc course. He's going to dig it out for me so I can do the assignments on it - apparently it takes you through creating, uploading and managing a site - just the sort of thing I need.

    Thanks again for the replies. I'll keep on with dreamweaver and get to learning html. :cooldude:
     
  18. Dad

    Dad You talkin to me?

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    Oh god, this old argument again - Dreamweaver sucks, real men use textpad... :rolleyes:

    G-gnome... Dude, I'm a Webmaster for a large hospital, I've been designing web sites since '95 or '96. I know how to code anything I need by hand, but use Dreamweaver.

    I don't want to hear the "real men use text pad" garbage either. Real men who have real deadlines and need to produce use a program like Dreamweaver to simplify and streamline their operation. Don't get me wrong, it's important to know HOW to code by hand so that you can tweek your site...
     
  19. death_star

    death_star What's a Dremel?

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    If you dont mind the change of people selling your info you can use www.1and1.com for free hosting for 3 years, my site modsource.net is hosted there. Also if your too lazy to make layout your self you can use www.e107.org which my site is also coded in. Hope that helps a little.
     
  20. OneSeventeen

    OneSeventeen Oooh Shiny!

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    I write everything on a stone tablet first, so I'm sure it is rock solid, then after measuring everything with a slide rule I build a linux box out of scrap parts from behind radio shack. I run emacs for the color coding function, although I'm using a green and black monitor, so I can't see it anyway, then I set up a script to ftp into my account and upload a file each time I update it, unless the file ends with the word 'beta' in which case it will do nothing.

    I also don't use a mouse, and dial in through payphones using fake usernames and passwords I sniffed off a local university's telenet system.
     

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