What Is the Function of Web Page Design Software?
Since the introduction of the World Wide Web in the early 1990's, hundreds of millions of websites have been made. A large percentage of these websites have been made using Web page design software. Web design software is also known as a WYSIWYG editor, which is an acronym for "What You See Is What You Get," rather than typing the code and then seeing it in a browser window. This type of software has several functions and applications.
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Purpose of Web Design Software
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The main function of Web page design software is to make it easy to create a website. The majority of people who want a website or want to create a website do not know how to simply write the code and know what will happen in a browser that is interpreting the code. Web page design software was made to help these people design websites on their own in a simple way that isn't as difficult as learning HTML, CSS, Javascript, PHP and all the code languages necessary to create a functional site. Web design software provides a hands-on approach to creating a website.
Creating With Web Design Software
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Web page design software has been available for purchase from many companies, each brand with its own strong points and weaknesses. Now, there are also online Web page editors that you can use from your home computer for free or with a registration fee. Creating a site using Web page design software involves beginning with a basic template, specifying the columns, layout and width. Then, the user can add components such as images, content, text areas, links, navigation and so forth. This way, the user can decide where he wants each component visually rather than having to type numbers to place it.
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Publishing With Web Design Software
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Web design software usually provides a function to publish the website on the internet without having to know the practical bits of publishing a site with an FTP client such as FileZilla. This function usually pulls all your folders from your computer and sets them up on the server that you specify. It is possible to update the site as well using this function.
Disadvantages of Web Design Software
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Although Web design software is a useful tool, it does present disadvantages as well as the advantages. Because the software generates code automatically on several levels as the user adds, changes or deletes components in a site's layout, it ends up creating unnecessary lines of code in the original files. This makes it more difficult for the browser to interpret the code and slows the loading speed of the Web pages a little bit. It also makes it much more difficult to go into the code and alter it manually, and it provides less control over the design than hand-coding. An un-seen disadvantage but one that will become more important as Web browsers become more standardized is that Web design editors often produce code that does not comply with the official W3C standards for HTML and CSS. There are advantages and disadvantages to using Web design software, and it is your choice as to which is more important.
Types of Web Design Software
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There are quite a few choices for someone who wants to acquire Web design software. Although free software is rarely as quality as software that you have to pay for, there are many popular free Web design softwares available across the Internet. A few of these are EvrSoft, PersonalWebKit, SeaMonkey and Amaya. If a prospective Web designer has some cash to spend, there are professional programs such as Adobe Dreamweaver, Microsoft Expression Web, Adobe Contribute and Nvu. Choosing a piece of software from among so many options takes quite a bit of research, and each software has specific abilities and weaknesses.
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