Web site and search engines

[raynerj1]

John,

I am not knocking your export filter. For what it does it works great. Hand slung programming is better (although a real pain for most to learn). Xara without the html export works great also.

You name it, you can do it with xara when it comes to web graphics.

[steve.ledger]

John I don't thing other John thought you were having a go at the HTML export feature of Xtreme. He was asking why you though Peter could handle your 'hang slung' comment when he has trouble even understanding wizzywiged html.
If the understanding of html wizzywig export is (almost) beyond his current understanding, then understanding how to write html code by hand using only a text editor would be like running up a waterfall.
It was a matter of perspective in the context of the topic.

[Peter Prewett]

John I don't thing other John thought you were having a go at the HTML export feature of Xtreme. He was asking why you though Peter could handle your 'hang slung' comment when he has trouble even understanding wizzywiged html.
If the understanding of html wizzywig export is (almost) beyond his current understanding, then understanding how to write html code by hand using only a text editor would be like running up a waterfall.
It was a matter of perspective in the context of the topic.

That is not the case I would be quite capable of programming HTML as I have been programming BASIC since 1983, machine code in 1956 also C and C++ just not started on HTML as there has been other things in my life to do.

So do not put me down.

Thanks to everyone for there comments.
Peter

[steve.ledger]

Peter it was certainly not my intention to put you down in any way whatsoever. I apologise if this came across this way.

[Peter Prewett]

Peter it was certainly not my intention to put you down in any way whatsoever. I apologise if this came across this way.

Accepted.

I will go out and buy a book on HTML and study/practice and add it to my claim of being a jack of all trades and master of none.

There are some people that need a web site and cannot justify/afford employing someone to do it and are provided tools that only do part of the job that is the 'trap' I fell into.
It is easy to use XXP to create a web site but it needs a lot more experience and expertise to make it 'professional' product.

Peter

[raynerj1]

Hi Peter,

I have purchased books on the subject and downloaded pages from the net. I found the net is easier to reference and "free". If you are interested I can provide you with some decent stuff I downloaded and use as a reference all the time...

Just PM me... or email me from the link on my site.

I have tried most of the WYSIWIG programs, and I quit using them 5 minutes after I start playing with them. They do the job, but... It is like having somebody paint your picture for you. You never have complete control. When you need precise control, you need to just do it yourself.

[BobInce]

The main trap when looking for site authoring training materials is to plump for the biggest, brightest book in the shop. More pages may mean better value to some, but it'll be a worse learning experience!

(Although HTML is not really programming as such, it's similar to the case with C: you can buy any number of huge 'for dummies' or 'learn C in 21 days' tomes, but the original and very concise K&R is still the best.)

Today's modern [X]HTML is not difficult or complicated; your markup should be as minimal and simple as possible, with external CSS and JavaScript added where needed. But many of the books out there on the shelves will instead be "comprehensive", talking you through a million non-standard presentational tags, how to nest tables ten levels deep, and compatibility nonsense that only concerns Netscape 4 or IE5, browsers that have been dead for ages.

[pauland]

compatibility nonsense that only concerns Netscape 4 or IE5, browsers that have been dead for ages.

LOL, if only that were true.. ;-)

[BobInce]

if only that were true..

Well... I think it pretty much is now. Netscape 4 really is dead and buried... thank God, as its incompatibilities and bugs were so much deeper than any other popular browser. IE5 has been (at least in my stats) well under 1% for some time, so except for unusual situations like XP-on-first-setup and a few way-behind-on-updating corporates it's not worth worrying about.

Luckily if you target IE6-standards-mode upwards, IE5[.5] doesn't tend to break too badly... the layout often goes wonky, but the site will still generally work... more than you could say for Netscape 4, which would happily crash on the faintest whiff of anything from this century...

[pauland]

I was actually thinking more about current browsers and CSS - the box model for example, where workarounds still rear their ugly head..