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Cheryl W wrote
>
> One warning, I once "ruined" a fellow developer's JavaScript by opening
> the page in FP Editor. I didn't make any changes to the source code, I
> was in there to correct a typo. Anyway, FP made a mess of it and
> inserted all kinds of garbage so whenever I need to open that
> page now I use good ol' Word Pad.
>
> Cheryle
I use Front Page to prototype the user interface on our web applications. I can
get the job done very quickly. Our developers use NetDynamics and Cold Fusion.
Once they do anything to an html page in those applications, I cannot touch it
in Front Page anymore (incidents similar to Cheryle's experience).
Front Page served me well when I was learning web page design. But, it doesn't
take long to get into trouble with what you don't know about how and where an
editor inserts tags. Now I'm doing more editing of things the developers have
worked on, so I find myself using notepad. I'd like one tool that I could use
consistently for rapid development and editing. I can learn varied tools, but
switching seems inefficient (and risky given that the one product can damage
scripts).
This seems analogous to using 35 mm cameras. Mine can be used in automatic mode
and requires little effort--great for parties and quick shots. Or, I can set it
to manual mode, adjust F-stops, add filters, etc--great for artistic shots.
Automatic mode takes same very nice snapshots, but it's hard to get the special
effects. I need to know more to control it manually, but I like the results.
There are times when either automatic or manual will work. There are other
times when the choice of setting is obvious.