What tools do you use?

[MasonC]

I am a beginner.

I find EditPlus an excellent html/css editor:

http://www.editplus.com/

For simultaneously editing many pages, I find Search and Replace
essential:

http://www.funduc.com/search_replace.htm

I have a collection of "modern" browsers to test:
MSIE6, Opera 7.23, Netscape 7.1, Mozilla 1.6, Firefox 0.8

The advice given here on ciwas has been priceless.

Please post your recommendations .

Mason C http://masonc.home.netcom.com

[Mark Johnson]

Re: What tools do you use?

MasonC <masonc@ix.netc om.xyz.com> wrote:
[color=blue]
>I am a beginner.[/color]
[color=blue]
>I find EditPlus an excellent html/css editor:[/color]
[color=blue]
> http://www.editplus.com/[/color]

I like notepad, myself. But since it's too small, I use Ultra-Edit,
which I've used for years, and is a heck of text editor!

I like CSE validator for validation. It's also a pretty popular tool.
I remember literally defending early versions against the 'purists'
trying to speak on behalf of W3C, back about five or so years ago.

I don't chop up rollover graphics so much, now, but when I did I went
with PSP's somewhat limited editor, or you could use Fireworks, which
is a little over-complicated. Adobe has Image Ready, which comes with
PS. But I never use it.

Basically, if I don't create the page by hand, I generate the thing
with a proprietary database, one that I wrote myself. It presents all
the necessary info in 'tree fashion', in XML. And then that is
transformed into the XHTML output using an XSLT template program. And
the result is saved to disk, in the proper directory, with all the
links to other site pages properly adjusted. And it will validate with
CSE or I'll tweak the XSLT to make sure it does. But generation of
xhtml is really the preferred way to go. You keep the essential info
in a database. You can cross-reference, run a view in any fashion, and
so on. I just haven't incorporated general mark-up, as yet. So I
cannot include fairly complicated and marked-up paragraphs. Mark-up is
nested. I still do that, by hand - although I do have Dreamweaver. I
just have no table to put these in my own db. The nested mark-up model
is quite different than the relational model. But it's pretty much the
next logical step to making this tool generally applicable. It means
looking at an internet IE activeX control, which I've been trying to
avoid. It comes with your IE installation and is then available to
Office VB or studio programming apps.

[color=blue]
>For simultaneously editing many pages, I find Search and Replace
>essential:[/color]
[color=blue]
> http://www.funduc.com/search_replace.htm[/color]

Ultra-Edit has a global find and replace, as well. But you probably
want to load in boilerplate from a single source. If changes are made,
it's made just to the one file. It's almost like a violation of a
transcendent rule, also found in db design, of not putting the same
info everywhere, so that you have to update it, everywhere. Keep it in
one place.

[color=blue]
>I have a collection of "modern" browsers to test:
> MSIE6, Opera 7.23, Netscape 7.1, Mozilla 1.6, Firefox 0.8[/color]
[color=blue]
>The advice given here on ciwas has been priceless.[/color]
[color=blue]
>Please post your recommendations .[/color]
[color=blue]
> Mason C http://masonc.home.netcom.com[/color]

I don't know what the advantage of testing Firefox or Opera would be.
I thought NN 7 was a 'standards compliant' mozilla browser. All things
being equal, I'd prefer it over IE 6. But everyone uses IE 5+, and
moreso now, IE 6. I don't think you can share IE. So you might have a
dockable drive with IE 5+, say, and a common HD in the computer which
can be shared? Then you could test against each. IE 5, for example,
presents a few unique problems of its own. But I don't know how many
still use IE 5. Mostly it's 5.5 and up. And there may be noticeable OS
differences. Mac implementations are notorious for giving divergent
results. But could be the same for a difference between Win98, 2000,
and XP, as well, or even between XP, and XP Pro. And I don't know if
you still want to test NN 4.7. Personally, I'd give up on NN 6. Shunt
it to a basic page layout. And I'd think I'd do the same for Opera. I
think you should stick, mainly, to IE 5.5 and IE 6, just in my
opinion. But tastes can change. Keep up with things and see how the
ships are leaning.

[Mark Johnson]

Re: What tools do you use?

MasonC <masonc@ix.netc om.xyz.com> wrote:
[color=blue]
>I am a beginner.[/color]
[color=blue]
>I find EditPlus an excellent html/css editor:[/color]
[color=blue]
> http://www.editplus.com/[/color]

I like notepad, myself. But since it's too small, I use Ultra-Edit,
which I've used for years, and is a heck of text editor!

I like CSE validator for validation. It's also a pretty popular tool.
I remember literally defending early versions against the 'purists'
trying to speak on behalf of W3C, back about five or so years ago.

I don't chop up rollover graphics so much, now, but when I did I went
with PSP's somewhat limited editor, or you could use Fireworks, which
is a little over-complicated. Adobe has Image Ready, which comes with
PS. But I never use it.

Basically, if I don't create the page by hand, I generate the thing
with a proprietary database, one that I wrote myself. It presents all
the necessary info in 'tree fashion', in XML. And then that is
transformed into the XHTML output using an XSLT template program. And
the result is saved to disk, in the proper directory, with all the
links to other site pages properly adjusted. And it will validate with
CSE or I'll tweak the XSLT to make sure it does. But generation of
xhtml is really the preferred way to go. You keep the essential info
in a database. You can cross-reference, run a view in any fashion, and
so on. I just haven't incorporated general mark-up, as yet. So I
cannot include fairly complicated and marked-up paragraphs. Mark-up is
nested. I still do that, by hand - although I do have Dreamweaver. I
just have no table to put these in my own db. The nested mark-up model
is quite different than the relational model. But it's pretty much the
next logical step to making this tool generally applicable. It means
looking at an internet IE activeX control, which I've been trying to
avoid. It comes with your IE installation and is then available to
Office VB or studio programming apps.

[color=blue]
>For simultaneously editing many pages, I find Search and Replace
>essential:[/color]
[color=blue]
> http://www.funduc.com/search_replace.htm[/color]

Ultra-Edit has a global find and replace, as well. But you probably
want to load in boilerplate from a single source. If changes are made,
it's made just to the one file. It's almost like a violation of a
transcendent rule, also found in db design, of not putting the same
info everywhere, so that you have to update it, everywhere. Keep it in
one place.

[color=blue]
>I have a collection of "modern" browsers to test:
> MSIE6, Opera 7.23, Netscape 7.1, Mozilla 1.6, Firefox 0.8[/color]
[color=blue]
>The advice given here on ciwas has been priceless.[/color]
[color=blue]
>Please post your recommendations .[/color]
[color=blue]
> Mason C http://masonc.home.netcom.com[/color]

I don't know what the advantage of testing Firefox or Opera would be.
I thought NN 7 was a 'standards compliant' mozilla browser. All things
being equal, I'd prefer it over IE 6. But everyone uses IE 5+, and
moreso now, IE 6. I don't think you can share IE. So you might have a
dockable drive with IE 5+, say, and a common HD in the computer which
can be shared? Then you could test against each. IE 5, for example,
presents a few unique problems of its own. But I don't know how many
still use IE 5. Mostly it's 5.5 and up. And there may be noticeable OS
differences. Mac implementations are notorious for giving divergent
results. But could be the same for a difference between Win98, 2000,
and XP, as well, or even between XP, and XP Pro. And I don't know if
you still want to test NN 4.7. Personally, I'd give up on NN 6. Shunt
it to a basic page layout. And I'd think I'd do the same for Opera. I
think you should stick, mainly, to IE 5.5 and IE 6, just in my
opinion. But tastes can change. Keep up with things and see how the
ships are leaning.

[MasonC]

Re: What tools do you use?

On Mon, 26 Apr 2004 00:05:27 -0700, Mark Johnson <102334.12@comp userve.com> wrote:

regarding "boilerplat e" (for example, the material found in all of my
web pages)
[color=blue][color=green]
>>For simultaneously editing many pages, I find Search and Replace
>>essential:[/color]
>[color=green]
>> http://www.funduc.com/search_replace.htm[/color]
>
>Ultra-Edit has a global find and replace, as well. But you probably
>want to load in boilerplate from a single source. If changes are made,
>it's made just to the one file. It's almost like a violation of a
>transcendent rule, also found in db design, of not putting the same
>info everywhere, so that you have to update it, everywhere. Keep it in
>one place.[/color]

How does one load boilerplate from a single source?
(I've read a rumour of that coming in CSS 3 ?)
(I know how to do it with javascript, but it's cumbersome)
(common images are not a problem)

Mason C

[Mark Johnson]

Re: What tools do you use?

MasonC <masonc@ix.netc om.xyz.com> wrote:
[color=blue]
>How does one load boilerplate from a single source?[/color]

<xsl:include href="../common/Util.xsl"/>

for a file called, Util.xsl in some directory, common, in XSLT.

<script language="Javas cript" src="Util.js"
type="text/javascript"></script>

for a javascript file called, Util.js .

[color=blue]
>(I've read a rumour of that coming in CSS 3 ?)[/color]

In general, I think the application side, built in, solution is going
to be superior to something which is more of a hack. But the two
methods above are pretty standard, and use built-in capability.


See, you could include whatever is in Util.js in more than one html
page. But then if you found a bug, you'd have to change it in every
page. If you load it as an external file, then whatever changes you
make to the one, single file are incorporated the next time any page
is loaded or reloaded. It can be common javascript code. It could be
some series of document.writes that place even html into any document.