The code generated by wysiwygs, even when it's valid markup (which any WYSIWYG more than three years old usually doesn't even try to do) is some of the fattest nonsensical bloated rubbish. It is almost never semantic markup, it inlines tons of presentational markup, and in general makes the code itself redundant and overcomplicated to the point that when you have an error it's nigh impossible to find - and often it's faster for a REAL web developer to throw it out and start over from scratch than it is to even THINK about fixing it. Cryptic classnames and ID's, presentational classnames and ID's, directly tied to presentational markup or worse, inlining CSS (defeating the point of CSS) - it's a train wreck. Adding to these headaches are the default templates these various programs come with - MOST of them haven't been updated since 1998 and many of the scripts they tell you to use were a bad idea a decade ago, and have no place in a modern design... see that STUPID MALFING ****TARDED mm_swap RUBBISH!!! I have a formula that I use to determine how well coded a section of HTML is. You view the page in a browser, select all, and copy what it lets you select to a text editor to determine how much ACTUAL content is on the page. You then count the objects, images and embeds, and add them up thus: 1k+content*1.5+200 bytes per CONTENT image+400 bytes per object/embed. If it exceeds those numbers it's probably sloppy code - if it exceeds that total by 50% or more, it's probably outright rubbish. Oh, and content images does NOT include things like borders, logos, and other 'presentational' elements. Clean minimalist semantic markup is almost by default search optimized code-wise (though content management is just as important), easier to maintain, and once you understand the technologies it's faster to maintain... Even if you don't use the wysiwyg a lot of the... 'features' in the editors sections like in dreamweaver... well... They get in the way and do not promote good coding habits. Automatic indentation, auto-formatting tools, code completion, and syntax highlighting lead to sloppy and lazy coding habits and hours spent cleaning up mistakes when you get to the validation phase that shouldn't even have existed in the first place. (though on syntax highlighting, that could just be predjudice on my part from my eyes protesting to the difficult to read low-contrast acid-trips). You take the time to learn to use the tab key, learn to do block indents and de-indents, you don't need any of that **** and in fact, some things like code completion can slow you down. (though that could be the nun whacking me across the knuckles screaming "INDENT" and "DE-INDENT" - what happens when a Jew goes to a Catholic school for programming classes in the 70's) Tell you what, link to something you designed in 3dcart, and I'll give you a breakdown of what's wrong with it, what pitfalls are present, etc, etc.
Well, they stopped doing that now. In CS4 they are going to f**k up WebKit (Btw that big smile is a lie) Pfft. The others I'll agree with, but syntax highlighting is your blindness talking, it is extraodinarily helpful, though I can live without it. Oooh. Do it! Having deathshadow tell me what was so crap about my layouts actually made me a good coder. Though if you have a weak stomach, he can be a bit much to take
you need to have the jpeg images saved in your sites folder and make sure that the image in the html links to your documents. You cannot store an image in an html file.
WYSIWYG as deathshadow said so well gives garbage code.... I liek DW a lot jsut cuz of the colours they put in the code your writing....all that drag and drop stuff is kinda useless.
Dreamweaver is good when you know what your doing. Know the HTML and CSS before opening the dreamweaver program and you might get a decent web designer out of you yet. In media tech they made us make a webpage with 8 pages and some dynamic content purely by css and HTML in word pad. Then they let us use dreamweaver... please learn the CSS... you can find tutorials on google
Agreed, though I find if I've got a black background in my editor, it's easier on my eyes to just have white text. With a white background though, syntax highlighting lets me scan by colour instead of actually reading. It's easier for me to find the red square among the whites ones than find the word "rood" among the "wit"s.
Thanks I think you have said it all. I just cant understand why people can't have the patience to sit down, open a notepad and write good codes.
Well if you can't be bothered/just can't do it, no point of you actually doing it... Its like becoming a chef when you can't cook - no point in it.
To paraphrase Eisenhower - "Laziness, ignorance and just plain wishful thinking" Schizo - you mentioned talent. To be honest, talent has little to do with it. Patience, devotion, planning and time are the only things needed to design a site properly. Goes with what I tell clients and I've heard Dan Schulz use this a few times as well: You can have a website three ways; Cheap, well coded or soon. Pick only two. Bottom line - it's called WORK, and a lot of people don't want to do work, they want the quick fix common to today's "Now" mentality. Instant gratification no matter how mediocre it ends up or how much it's going to bite you in the ass further down the road. You know, same thing as "I can't afford the Plasma TV today, so I'll pay three times as much for it over the next three years" Again, Carlos Mencia grey territory.
Being a web developer I prefer, better tool than dreamweaver. TextMate fits my needs better on Mac. A powerful text editor like this is all you need, if you know your stuff. For PC users e-Texteditor is the clone of TextMate. I am still evaluating it though, but seems pretty decent. Does almost everything you can do on TextMate.