Re: OT, but you guys know everything!!! What web page design software should I use?

Roveer wrote:
I'm taking over our company website and need some suggestions
concerning what software I use.

The previous person who created and maintained our website did it in
Frontpage 2000. Just having played with FP I see that It's quite a
bit different than the HTML that I'm used to seeing. FP extensions
create all these _vti_cnf hidden directories and make a real mess of
everything (or so I think).

In addition to that, he used "hover buttons" on our theme and many of
our pages. As a result these buttons are "java". While I love java I
have to be realistic in that every PC shipped with XP and above did
NOT have java installed so many many users won't be able to navigate
our website or it will appear broken. I want to make sure I'm correct
in my assessment here. Is this true? I have a laptop without java
installed and the buttons appear as empty boxes (broken links).

So as a part of the website re-design I think I'm going to eliminate
java because of this problem. Set me straight here if I'm wrong.
Again, I love java, install it as a part of every desktop I build, but
most people don't.

Now, should I keep using frontpage 2003 or go with something else? If
I'm going to invest the time to learn a web design package I might as
well go in the right direction. If one much more preferred than the
others or are they all pretty much the same?

I just dont' want to invest a lot of time and re-build our webite just
to find out I should have used something else.

As always, I really appreciate your comments. Sorry I'm off topic
here, but you guys do know the most about most things and I respect
your opinions.


There is a big difference between Java and JavaScript, and the latter will do most minor tasks and exists in pretty much all browsers. It's considered reasonably safe, though I'm quite keen on browsing with it all turned off, enabling JavaScript only on sites I trust. Google 'cross site scripting' if you want a scare.

I have a preference for avoiding even JS in my web pages, for running code on the server rather than on a user's machine, but then I'm not a web designer. I'm afraid what web work I do tends to happen in a text editor, contains no animation whatever and is tested on at least three major rendering engines, so I'm very obviously *not* a web designer by profession.

I think it has to depend on what your employer wants by way of results, how many pages you're expecting to make, whether you need active content, and various other things. If he's been talked into lots of fancy animations and JavaScript gadgets, then you'll probably need to look at fairly serious web authoring packages. If you're not going for the big corporate extravaganza, then look for something that features good use of CSS, as the layout and behaviour of the page is heavily dependent on that rather than the HTML, whether static or dynamic. FrontPage 2003 allows the use of style sheets, but doesn't generate them. You're expected to know how to do that yourself.

It's a whole profession in itself, and you'll need someone experienced to advise on current products. As you expected, I don't think you'll find that expertise here.
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