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Open Source Alternative to Dreamweaver's .LBI?
An anonymous reader asks: "I have recently started using Dreamweaver to manage one of many websites that I work on. One feature that I am growing to love is the ability to use Dreamweaver library files (.LBI). What are Slashdot readers' opinions on this format? Is there something better (read: free and standards-compliant)? I also would like to find something I could use on an open-source platform so that I won't be locked in to using Dreamweaver. What do you use for your sites?"
Any real self respecting geek writes the html and css in the raw. It's the only way.
Not only that, but it makes for better pages. The code is not bloated, and the layout is more optimized. Hand-coding websites also gives you a chance to find new ways of doing things instead of the same old tricks.
My design process includes Fireworks, also by Macromedia. My first step is drawing the page layout with all the images and menus. It's the easiest way to play around and find what looks just right. My next step is re-creating the page using minimal images, css, and xhtml. After it looks like the original images, I optimize the code and make sure the layout works in ALL browsers. I might also add in a step that includes javascript or server-side code if its necessary. This design process has served me very well.
As for the question, I've used Dreamweaver, but never liked the extra features. I use it as a file manager and syntax highlighter when I'm on Windows, that about all (except FTP). I find the best way to manage your site is to have it manageable by design. Descriptive file names, good directory structure, and organization. That way you wont be locked into any specific solution.
Correction: "Any web developer worth his salt writes raw HTML and CSS"
...I couldn't say "in the raw" with a straight face. And may Eric forgive me for using bold tags.
CSS is the only way to keep your sanity when you're writing a lot of pages. And the best way to keep pages clean and maintainable is to do it in a plain text editor. (A smart one though, like jEdit)
Or do you have too much time on your hands to put accursed FONT tags around every morsel of the web page?
And yes, I do this professionally.
P.S.
SYS 64738 NO CARRIER
In fact, the proper way to do templates is xslt/css, maybe with some xincludes, and so on. And in fact, I am already prepared for the ideal world where all those standards are supported by most browsers, so that the change doesn't have to propegate through files at all.
I use a text editor and raw xml, because I want my documents to last forever with minimal maintenance. Dreamweaver will not last forever. Long after ASCII itself has fallen to UTF-8, my documents will stand, with the active support of only one individual -- ME. If the LIB file is easy to write scripts for without the use of Dreamweaver, I might consider it, and then reject it, because browsers do not support Dreamweaver -- but they do support xslt.
As far as speed and ease, what's really needed is a good xml editor. I haven't tried any proprietary ones, and there aren't any good free ones. What'd really be nice is some sort of tab-completion for xml elements, based on elements that already exist in the same document, or on some common library based on what it's learned from watching you.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
PRAISE VIM!
.vimrc config for editing html/php:
:syntax on
:hi comment ctermfg=2 cterm=NONE " dark green
:hi constant ctermfg=2 cterm=bold " light green
:hi operator ctermfg=1 cterm=bold " light red
:hi type ctermfg=7 cterm=bold " light white
:hi function ctermfg=4 cterm=bold " light blue
:hi statement ctermfg=1 cterm=bold " light red
:hi identifier ctermfg=3 cterm=bold " light yellow
:hi special ctermfg=6 cterm=bold " light cyan
:hi phpSpecialChar ctermfg=6 cterm=bold " light cyan. needed because sometimes
:hi include ctermfg=7 cterm=bold " light white
:hi define ctermfg=7 cterm=bold " light white
:hi delimiter ctermfg=6 cterm=bold " light cyan
Here is my favourite (partial)
set nocp
set backspace=2
set history=200
set ruler
set splitbelow
set undolevels=100
set visualbell
set mouse=a
set showbreak=+\
set foldmethod=marker
" enable syntax highlighting
" set the fg colors for some types of words
" special is not recognized
LOVE THY VIM. PRAISE THY VIM!
Reinard
Plenty good enough to get started with, WYSIWYG and all. Produces much nicer HTML if started in HTML mode rather than writer mode, but even so in writer mode, it's chalk-and-cheese better than the abominations MS-Word spits out.
My own website, while hardly a paragon of usability or graphic design, is mostly built on OOW-edited HTML that's been fed to a gawk script which rips off the head and tail, replacing them with PHP calls to generic top-and-tail scripts which do the preamble, headings, menu, links-here, translation form (thanks Google) etc.
This makes consistency much easier, it's quick to edit stuff up (I use Linux, but that remains true even on MS Windows) and massaging MS-Word docs and the like to suit (precious few of those on my site but I do this elsewhere too) is fairly straightforward, although I usually have sed discuss some of the resulting HTML's shortcomings up close and personal before feeding it to the top-and-tailer. You'll notice that all of the W3C buttons work.
If I've just got to add an item to a menu or whatever, simple little tasks, it's vim all the way, and of course for a larger, more complex site I'd take a completely different approach.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
Anyone who uses Dreamweaver for any serious work is off their freaking rocker. I can't imagine for the life of me why anyone would use those tools. It's not just code bloat that makes them so awful but the simple fact that it keeps you ignorant! Do you think the really really interesting and well-designed websites used Dreamweaver for anythign other than project management? You have to get dirty if you want to learn how to code anythign on the web. There are so many undocumented or undervalued tricks to be discovered! But you'll never discover them because Dreamweaver, Frontpage, etc. are made to do one thing: make your website fit within the confines of that program. If Dreamweaver can't do it, you can't do it. That's kind of sad.
:) Extensible, syntax highlighting, project management, open source, free, CVS repository browsing and control, internal PHP processor, internal Perl RegEx engine, Apache control, [insert your need here]
As for what I use (yes I am a professional for almost ten years now).....
Eclipse Eclipse Eclipse Eclipse Eclipse Eclipse
Have I made my point yet?
Eclipse is an unbelievable tool that I have been using for about a year now and I keep finding new ways for it to help me do my job better.
You can go to Eclipse.org to pick up a copy. I highly recommend getting v3.0 M8
Ha.
It seems like you are assuming that the only reason some one would use a WYSIWYG editor is because they don't know HTML. This is completely off base. Any decent webdesigner needs to at least have a working knowledge of HTML regardless of the tool they use to create/generate it, simply from the standpoint that they have to know what is possible with HTML.
Reading all of these posts really cracks me up. I have seen so many self-righteous posters talking about "hand coding" HTML as if it was some kind of difficult task. Here's a bit of information for you all: HTML is easy, and knowing how to "code" it hardly makes you the hard core individual you see yourself as.
The real challenge in Webdesign is the design aspect of it. What someone uses to implement that design shouldn't even be an issue. Does it hurt your feelings that perhaps they can work faster than you using a WYSIWYG?
On a side note, I'm not really attacking the parent post here, but I had to reply to one of them.
Also note that I don't use WYSIWYGs myself, but that is just because when I do webdesign (a rare event these days) I usually am working on dynamic websites (usually in PHP). If I was writing a static page I sure wouldn't waste my time to "hand code" HTML just so I could feel cool. That is like writing all my documents in postscript just to be hard core. There is no benefit, just more work.
I just recently did this when my brother asked for a site, he was running for president of a vasrity association, I used a basic bluerobot.com 3 column css design and did the whole thing in raw html and css. It drove me nuts when he requested extra pages and I had to modify every page's navigation bar. What I did was install php cg in my WinXP machine and use simple includes, in the form
If you want your site to be XHTML you will have to disable the short tags in the php.ini configuration file (I don'remember exactly how at the moment), otherwise the php parser will go nut with the xml tags.
the site's draft will be up for a few days at this very linkrottable place. It was a quick and dirty job but it looked quite nice and most of the pages were XHTML 1.1 standards compliant. (my brother lost the election though)
So, in conclusion, if you have a win machine get yourself a copy of html-kit, and topstyle (free beer both) and install php cgi but don't configure it for any server, create php files and run the command line: c:\path\to\php.exe c:\path\to\phpfile.php > c:\path\to\resultingfile.html. I had a batch file that did this for all the files in the site. Then upload the html files. All the php parsing is done on your computer so you will be uploading plain html.
good luck
If you want your site to be XHTML you will have to disable the short tags in the php.ini configuration file (I don'remember exactly how at the moment), otherwise the php parser will go nut with the xml tags.
Nope. The only thing PHP doesn't like about XHTML is processing instructions and the XML prolog. If you include either of these in an XHTML page, you aren't following Appendix C of XHTML 1.0 and you are not allowed to serve it as text/html. If you don't serve it as text/html, Internet Explorer won't understand it.
So basically, if you are having trouble with PHP short tags on a mainstream website, you are already in violation of at least one standard.
It was a quick and dirty job but it looked quite nice and most of the pages were XHTML 1.1 standards compliant.
XHTML 1.1 is not eligible for being served as text/html (you should use something like application/xhtml+xml instead). It sounds like you are breaking the rules of RFC 2854.