Is there a cut-down version of DW available... OR recommend any alternative?
in [Dreamweaver]
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From: ship on 30 May 2007 05:34 Hi We are just a small company. I have potentially two members of staff that I need to get to write very simple HTML emails for sending to our (quite large) list of customers. I have been using Dreamweaver for several years. - Can anyone suggest a *LOW COST* way to get my staff developing HTML on a "WYSIWYG" style editor like Dreamweaver? "DW CS3" seems like gross over-kill for what we need. - I am using Dreamweaver 8. OK, it's a LONG way from perfect but what I like about DW8 is: a) it is 'well behaved' and doesnt rewrite/re-format code without asking b) the WYSISYG seems to work quite well c) It allows you to reformat HTML when it gets into a mess d) String-changes are quite powerful ....But DW8 is MUCH more powerful than what we need to write basic HTML and much too expensive as a result! Also I dont really understand the adobe website: http://www.adobe.com/uk/products/dreamweaver/ It seems that you HAVE to buy bundles of software now - can that be true? If Adobe wont sell us anything cut down then maybe we could buy an OLD version of DW somewhere?! - What is the software of choice for low skill level/occassional users? Ship Shiperton Henethe
From: Andy Dingley on 30 May 2007 06:06 On 30 May, 10:34, ship <ship...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > I have potentially two members of staff that I need to get to write > very simple > HTML emails for sending to our (quite large) list of customers. Then teach them some HTML and have them use a text editor. They'll also find this to be much quicker to use. This is useful for HTML web pages. This is _crucial_ for HTML email. For that matter, so is understanding the email RFCs and how to do multipart encoding propertly. DW is not only expensive, it writes bad web pages and it writes terrible HTML emails (mainly because they're so bloated) Good books to read would be "Head First HTML" or Lie & Bos' "Cascading Style Sheets"
From: ship on 30 May 2007 06:45 > Then teach them some HTML and have them use a text editor. They'll > also find this to be much quicker to use. One of our staff has already been coding HTML by hand (using a text editor) and it's VERY time consuming. So I have to disagree about speed. DW is *fairly* well behaved in my experience. What is deeply unacceptable is what happens when you use Ms Outlook. (or any other Ms product!) > This is _crucial_ for HTML email. For that matter, so is understanding > the email RFCs and how to do multipart encoding propertly. Forgive my ignorance what is an "RFC" (Remote Function Call? Reason For Change? Request For Comment? Rugby Football Club...?) - Can anyone point me to an nice idiot's guide to multipart encoding? (which I gather is important... but which we have never used and do not frankly understand what it is!) > DW is not only expensive, YES! > it writes bad web pages and it writes > terrible HTML emails (mainly because they're so bloated) I thinks this is only slightly true and sounds biased to me. Slightly bloated code is not a problem in any case (try seeing what crud Ms Outlook2003 spits out !!) > Good books to read would be "Head First HTML" or Lie & Bos' "Cascading > Style Sheets" With thanks Ship Shiperton Henethe On May 30, 11:06 am, Andy Dingley <ding...(a)codesmiths.com> wrote: > On 30 May, 10:34, ship <ship...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > I have potentially two members of staff that I need to get to write > > very simple > > HTML emails for sending to our (quite large) list of customers. > > Then teach them some HTML and have them use a text editor. They'll > also find this to be much quicker to use. > > This is useful for HTML web pages. > > This is _crucial_ for HTML email. For that matter, so is understanding > the email RFCs and how to do multipart encoding propertly. > > DW is not only expensive, it writes bad web pages and it writes > terrible HTML emails (mainly because they're so bloated) > > Good books to read would be "Head First HTML" or Lie & Bos' "Cascading > Style Sheets"
From: Andy Dingley on 30 May 2007 08:23 On 30 May, 12:26, Toby A Inkster <usenet200...(a)tobyinkster.co.uk> wrote: > If they're very simple HTML, then consider installing something like > Markdown or Textile on your server which converts plain text, marked up > with very simple techniques such as *bold*, _italic_ and so on, into HTML. Do they handle images? That's the only real justification for using HTML in a marketing email.
From: Andy Dingley on 30 May 2007 08:38
On 30 May, 11:45, ship <ship...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > One of our staff has already been coding HTML by hand (using a text > editor) and it's VERY time consuming. Then they should code simpler HTML. If the markup is simplified to the bare semantics of your email, you can boilerplate the beginnings of the new message, and you've a simple embedded CSS that handles the rest of the formatting, then this really is (as it should be) a quick hand-coding exercise. Toby has mentioned some text -> HTML tools. If these "work" (which I'd regard as meaning that they have a reasonable boilerplate / template facility and some decent image handling) then they'd also be a convenient way to do things. Otherwise any decent editor can convert double linebreaks to <p>...</p> etc. If "fluid design" and avoiding rigid pixel-sized page layouts is a good idea for "web HTML", then it's vital for "email HTML". This is a field where you really don't have control over browser windows etc. A WYSIWYG editor spewing out table-based markup is just the thing you don't want to be using here. > > This is _crucial_ for HTML email. For that matter, so is understanding > > the email RFCs and how to do multipart encoding propertly. > > Forgive my ignorance what is an "RFC" It means "RFC" (the expansion is irrelevant). They're the things that define the internet protocols, such as email. There are many web repositories of them, such as http://www.faqs.org/rfc-pop1.html Some are very commonly used, which includes 821, 822, 1521, 1522, 2046 (the numbers, from memory, of the email relevant ones) You should scan through all of these, reading one or two of them more carefully. I think 1521 / 1522 are the relevant ones for your encoding of the same email message on two formats. They're sometimes updated, which is why 2822 has now superceded 822, but they do try to keep the numbers sensible. To be honest, I very rarely use the things these days so I'm probably well rusty on the exact numbers. However they're well indexed and cross-referenced, so I'm sure you'll find what's necessary. > - Can anyone point me to an nice idiot's guide to multipart encoding? Hopefully someone (maybe Google) has one, but like I say, I'm rusty on email these days. > I thinks this is only slightly true and sounds biased to me. You're welcome to think that. OTOH, I'm not the one sending out bloated emails that can't be read on mobile devices. |