thinking of purchasing 365 - moving from Serif Webplus

[RachelSobie]

Hi All,

I currently use Serif Webplus x4 and have been looking at purchasing x8 and stumbled across this software and I really like the look of some of the features (looks easy to make mobile responsive sites/ page sizes easy to change) .

I have a few questions, I've tried using the search on this site but did not find the answers i require.

1. My website is e-commerce and I currently use Mals cart as the providor, can I use Mals on this software?

2. I've added my own snippets of HTML coding to my current website, can I do this with this software?

3. What happens if my computer stops working, can I download the software onto another PC?

4. Do you upload a mobile site to the same hosting as the desktop site? ie will it act as one website? if a desktop lands on a mobile site will it switch to the desktop site? (does that make sense?)

Thank you for reading my post

Rachel.

[gwpriester]

Welcome to TalkGraphics Rachel

1. I think so. One of the other members might know for sure.

2. Again, I think so. This is done in Web Designer and Designer Pro using "placeholders" which are just rectangles into which you can add scripts that get added to the HEAD and BODY sections of the HTML page.

3. You can install Web Designer on several computers, but there is a limit, I think 3.

4. Xara uploads both the regular and mobile site to the same folder and determines the appropriate variant for the device.

[Acorn]

Rachel, the limit is two working PCs for one licence.

You have to design your responsive variants; Xara only places the assets on the page and you decide position, presence and size.

Acorn

[RachelSobie]

Thanks for the replies.

So if I've got this right I choose a template which is responsive (which I belive all the templates are) then I design the desktop and moblie pages then upload both sites to my host. I then have a site that is responsive is that correct?

Also for payment gateways I use both the free version of mals e-commerce & Paypal. I use Mals as it as multiple delivery regions. I will use another gateway if it will do the same as I am not sure Mals is responsive as my customers can use my current website on their phones (but it is cumbersome) but they can't get to the payment screen. but having said that It works fine on my phone.

[RachelSobie]

another question, on Webplus it has boxes to fill in for SEO and what google/ search enigines put as page titles etc. Do you do this yourself with 365 or is it automatic.

[gwpriester]

You have to enter this meta data yourself for the page, and the website. There is also a box to enter Google Analytics tracking code.

You can download a free fully functional 30-day trial copy. The only thing missing I think is the websites and templates, but there might be a sample template and website.

[pauland]

Rachel, download the Trial and have a play.

Paul

[Room101]

I moved over from WebPlus as it cant build responsive websites, WD365 can.

The main thing you will notice as a change are

1. the lack of master pages, its just odd compared to WebPlus (and other software), WD365 repeats objects across pages. I prefer to use master pages.

2. WD365 does help you design responsive websites, and the implementation is quite good - BUT - and this is a really big one! ... I have used a template with three variants (a full screen, tablet and mobile phone) and the thing run dead slow - I mean really really slow. It runs slower on new fast windows 10 clean machine than WP runs on an old low spec machine. I can simply edit text and sit there waiting for it to change. Xara know of this issue.
Overall as I need to create responsive sites I will use WD365 simply because WebPlus cant. WD365 has some really good tricks (the ability for text to move easily around a graphic is one) that are much better than WebPlus - but the speed of the program is simply awful.

3. the menu (on the website) creation system is also far superior on WebPlus. On WP your popdown menus can simply follow your page order which you can nest. Its simply brilliant, automatic menu popdown. Xara claim theirs is a great system, its not, its manual and slow and doesn't work well across variants. The graphic customising of menus on WD365 is also limited and poor compared to Serifs software.

I'll hang on with WD365 simply due to the responsive capability, but I think they have some serious work to do re the speed of their software, the menu creation system and master pages (though not totally necessary) would be a bonus. If you want to create responsive sites with 3 variants or have anything beyond a basic menu and popdown system you may want to reconsider going to WD365.

Xara do have a good manual and help system though and the graphics handling is good. I would definitely download the trial software and try it out with a critical eye on speed (test using a 3 variant template) and the limited menu creation capability.

[mwenz]

No, Xara products do not build responsive web sites. They build a main static, fixed-position web site and, if desired, facilitate the building of what they call variants which are simply fixed-position pages at a different size.

[Acorn]

No, Xara products do not build responsive web sites. They build a main static, fixed-position web site and, if desired, facilitate the building of what they call variants which are simply fixed-position pages at a different size.

My tuppence worth. Xara claims it has "responsive" design as the presented web pages respond to be screen size. (Help > Index > About RWD).

Interestingly, the Internet (truth abounding) flips the definition of each term almost interchangeably so it is very, very confused.

1. The truth: http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/web...ve-web-design/
2. The controversy: https://css-tricks.com/the-differenc...aptive-design/ (particularly the Comments)

Xara offers sites that snap to a design presentation, dependent of the viewport width.
Everything is done on the browser (client-side) so all the pages assets for all the Variants come as one package.

In Xara's terminology, the converse "adaptive" design has a fluid grid presentation so if you have a PC and alter the browser by click-drag, the website grows and shrinks organically with individual elements being reshuffled within a fixed or variable container, itself in a larger container, just like piglets feeding.
Adaptive also purports to be server-side delivery, only sending down the needed layout and images at the required resolution.

Regardless of the terms, Xara's solution snaps to the browser width and uses the local browser to sort through everything to present the right design.
It works well for smaller sites with little image content but for heavily graphical sites, the download penalty is appalling.
Xara needs to tackle a lazy loading mechanism at some point.

In summary, Xara delivers adaptive content. I prefer snap and fluid to make the actual distinction.

Acorn