So whats the best HTML editing software?

Frontpage?

dreamweaver is the better than frontpage by leaps andbounds but still you might want to use a straight coder like notepad or a free cool one called html-kit

I haven't used any WYSIWYG editors in a while, but I believe Dreamweaver is leaps and bounds ahead of FrontPage.

Edit: Strange that we used the same phrasing. :P

I'm assuming you don't want to hand-code, right?

FrontPage is generally recognized as the worst possible choice for visual editors, simply because it has a history of not writing HTML. It writes its own Microsoft proprietary garbage and puts it in tags so it looks like HTML.

It's not nearly as bad as it used to be, but it's still not great. Save yourself some cash and check out www.nvu.com

I agree, I would class Dreamweaver as the best option for anyone as it is used by both beginners and professionals alike. It's good because you dont even need to know much HTML (Don't know whether that is important to ou or not). I've never liked frontpage, I dont really know why but i've never even tried to get a grasp on how it works. Dreamweaver is the way to go!

Another alternative to Macromedia Dreamweaver is a similar program called Macromedia HomeSite. I have been using HomeSite for years and absolutely love it! It is basically a stripped-down version of Dreamweaver, and it is just as good for HTML editing. If you are looking for the "best HTML editing software," you should definitely avoid Microsoft FrontPage altogether.

Another alternative to Macromedia Dreamweaver is a similar program called Macromedia HomeSite. I have been using HomeSite for years and absolutely love it! It is basically a stripped-down version of Dreamweaver, and it is just as good for HTML editing. If you are looking for the "best HTML editing software," you should definitely avoid Microsoft FrontPage altogether.

I recommend Dreamweaver MX. Homesite was 'abandoned' by Macromedia 2-3 years ago.

Originally posted by whatever
I recommend Dreamweaver MX. Homesite was 'abandoned' by Macromedia 2-3 years ago. Yes and no. I don't think it'll work well as an advanced XML editor or anything, but it's not like (X)HTML has changed much over the past few years. I think they simply haven't seen reason to improve it at this point. Homesite is my editor of choice all the way; I just figured given the contents of the original post that it was no use even suggesting a text editor.

It depends on exactly what you need. I use Frontpage quite a bit on some sites & it still can do a valid strict XHTML website :) - but any WYSIWYG editor will put in some bogus code. FP 2000 and 2002 was notorious for this. FP 2003 is a lot better & a lot of times actually puts in less code than DW on some things.

DW puts in all that extra JS when you want roll-overs etc. The only way to get away from that extra coding is to do it yourself.

I have a lot of clients who use FP to basically maintain their website. They seem to feel more comfortable with it than DW I have noticed.

I think that it all depends on your knowledge of HTML & what you need to do with it.

I'm fairly new at HTML and I've been using HTML-Kit (http://www.chami.com/html-kit/tour/) which i find very good.

Originally posted by joephill
So whats the best HTML editing software?

Frontpage?

Frontpage :sickface:

I'm just kidding of course. I really don't like Frontpage though. It is kind of nice in some ways to cut your teeth on but the code it produces is very sloppy and non-optimal. I started out with Frontpage years ago so I really am joking about it but now I just don't like its design interface or the code it produces from its WYSIWYG editor.

For my money, Dreamweaver is the best. It will be interesting to see what Adobe does with it. I never really liked their GoLive product.

Originally posted by the_pm
Yes and no. I don't think it'll work well as an advanced XML editor or anything, but it's not like (X)HTML has changed much over the past few years.

XHTML has always included support for Unicode, a.k.a. UTF-8. Homesite becomes utterly worthless when confronted with the utf-8 character set, which is sad. Thus Homesite is not to be used to edit XML files, period. Nor any other files saved as utf-8, like my CSS, XHTML, PHP and Javascript files are these days.

I'm hoping Adobe will implement this sorely needed fix. In the meantime, I've moved up to the Eclipse platform. I use the MyEclipseIDE package distribution, plus Oxygen XML editor. These two excellent commercial packages together cost a fraction of what FrontPage or Dreamweaver cost. Eclipse with plugins is definitely the way to go if Nvu is too basic for your needs.

Add the PHPEclipse open-source package, and you've got a far more powerful web development IDE at your fingertips than anything else out there. That's a bold statement, but I'll take the Pepsi challenge with my Eclipse setup against anything else out there (yes, I've tried all of them). The WYSIWYG editor is nice, for those rare times (like laying out a table) when I want such a thing.

Since it's Java, it's the same on all platforms. While it doesn't exactly load in a flash, once it's up the editors within are as fast as any others, with the notable exception of Oxygen which is hands down the nicest, fastest markup editor I've used, bar none.

I have one project right now, where I am using the Eclipse IDE to develop the following file types:

Java servlet
JSP
PHP
DTD
XSD
CSS
XML
XHTML
HTML
Javascript
RELAX NG
XSLT
XQUERY

In the case of the client-side technologies, I can preview each internally, and validate those which can be validated. The various server-side technologies can be previewed internally in either Apache/PHP/Tomcat, or Resin standalone + PHP servlet.

Got all those?

Yes, this app is always open on my desktop these days. I only close it when there's a new Windows update requiring a reboot. The sick thing about it, is I only know how to use about half of it. As soon as I learn regression testing, profiling and such, those are in there too.

With CSS, the editors I have to choose from within Eclipse are nice enough for editing/compiling existing CSS files, but I still prefer StyleMaster or TopStyle as a standalone CSS editor. The only thing I've found lacking in Eclipse is a comparably good CSS plugin.

The Eclipse platform itself started life as an IBM product, which IBM spun off into the open-source world. This is why, even with the nicer commercial plugins, it is a much cheaper solution than standalone apps. It also comes with some powerful capabilities of its own. The ability to search for a string or regex across all these filetypes within a single project is most addicting. Results are listed in their own pane, by clicking you bring the file up for editing, with the search string highlighted of course, in whichever editor you prefer for the file type.

For example, I can open an XHTML file in either the Eclipse built-in XML editor or the Oxygen XML editor, or I could open it in the PHP editor, or the MyEclipse WYSIWYG editor, or a raw text editor. Not to overwhelm anyone, but you can even configure code highlighting and font/size differently for each editor, some files I open in an alternate editor by right-clicking because it lays them out differently.

Here's the a-la-carte menu:

http://eclipse.org/
http://myeclipseide.com/
http://www.oxygenxml.com/
http://phpeclipse.sourceforge.net/

I've worked with both Frontpage and Dreamweaver... They both have their advantages and disadvantages.

Dreamweaver tries to tie everything into one program. It does have some really cool features that can make managing a site easy. I dont like doing my PHP programming with it though. I prefer to make my site designs, then do all the programming aspects using PHPEdit.

Frontpage is very easy to use, but nowhere near as powerful as dreamweaver.

You can still make a great looking website using either editor.