Website development tools

RELease 1.0, Sept 18, 1995 by Jerry Michalski

When Tim Berners-Lee developed the World Wide Web using a NEXT workstation, his software allowed users to browse and edit. The two functions have since split. Many Web developers use trusty old Unix editing tools such as Emacs, vi and pico to write HTML code, then they view the results with var ious Web browsers. This save/switch/reload cycle has become as familiar to Web developers as the compile/link-edit/run cycle has been for programmers for decades.

From a standing start a couple of years ago, many companies (and some talented individuals) have delivered HTHL editing tools, including Softquad's HoTMetal, Quarterdeck's HTML Editor for Microsoft Word, plug-in modules from Microsoft and WordPerfect for their word processors and HTML Edit from Hurray Altheim (see Resources, page 26, for pointers to these and other Web development aids). Most of these tools offer WYSIWYG display and editing; all of them are designed to deal with one Web page at a time.

These applications still leave Webmasters with plenty of unsolved site-management problems, and Web authors with complex tasks to master in order to make their sites more interesting or useful. It takes a rare combination of programmer, designer, editor, project manager, inventor, publisher, artist and masochist to master the art of Web creation with current tools.

Now several software vendors are beginning to offer Vabsice development tools that should save Web developers plenty of time and money in the long run not to mention irritation and stress. Instead of treating the page as the work unit, they focus on the entire Website. They not only make editing simpler, but they also solve problems, starting with managing links to and versions of the mass of files -- some local, some strewn across the world on the Internet -- that constitute a Website.

This issue of Release 1.0 is a roundup of site-oriented Web development tools in various stages of development. It covers new offerings from six companies: NaviSoft, Vermeer, Ceneca, Netscape, Microsoft and NEXT. Their descriptions begin on page 8.

Site-aware tools make it easier to create and focus on the structure of content. They combine aspects of team programming and design. Think of them as Computer-Aided Software Engineering (CASE) meets networkaware desktop publishing.

This issue doesn't cover Web server software, server management or click-stream tracking and analysis, nor does it cover secure servers and electronic commerce per se -- though some of what it covers is clearly beneficial to electronic commerce. It also doesn't cover turnkey or market-specific Website generators (see "Turnkey solutions").

Of course, we're selfishly motivated to investigate Web authoring tools. We'd love to find an environment that would allow us to create our material once, then publish it in many forums and formats, including the eminently portable, annotation-friendly paper newsletter.

SKIRMISH, RATTIE OR WAR?

It's easy to think of the Web as desktop publishing on communications steroids, but there is more at stake here. The battle for primacy of the communications and computing infrastructure has flared up again. Boxing agent Don King might bill this fight as Microsoft vs. Netscape, though it's not that clear cut.

Just as desktop publishing was born in the confluence of various technologies (i.e., the Macintosh, Adobels Postscript, Aldus Pagemaker and laser printing), now another confluence is underway that is potentially larger and farther-reaching. The burst of activity was sparked by the sudden critical mass of network connectivity that the Internet has brought. It is largely focused on the World Wide Web and new software architectures (e.g., components, helper apps and distributed programming systems).

The movement is expanding and drawing in other domains. It has already begun to shake up the worlds of client/server computing and multimedia communications; soon it will draw in telephony. It has also reinvigorated several slow-growth markets, including text retrieval,(1) document management and groupware. The Internet provides the conductive medium all these markets needed but couldn't generate on their own.

Is the network the computer?

We're in the middle of a major burst of evolutionary activity in what constitutes the computing and communications environment (see What's a zine?, Release 1.0, 6-95). The earliest client/server systems had applications that ran on servers and screen-control systems such as X Windows on client machines, which didn't offer much flexibility or local power. On the Web alone, developers now have a wide range of functionality available to them, from simple helper applications to increasingly integrated functionality (for a glimpse at where it's headed, see Netscape's news on page 16). Here are some examples, to illustrate the richness (and emerging complexity).

* Separate viewer applications, such as audio and video players.

* More interactive helper applications, which allow users to manipulate information rather than merely view it.