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Re: too bad he used NVU to do it
by Eric Laffoon on Saturday 31/Dec/2005, @02:40
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VPL does some things good, like adhering to your DTD and not mangling your entire file to edit one node. As for the rest... Don't forget it relies on KHTML which has also been under heavy development to support VPL. We had to write a lot of code just to find out if some things would even work and the complexity of the procedural discussions will make your eyes glaze over. The first code base of both the KHTML code and VPL was thrown out for the second which is being tossed aside for the third. The third should benefit from some of Apple's Webcore code and it should finally get a contextural interface. Even with the initial benefit of the KHTML rendering engine the task of visual development done right is a MASSIVE undertaking. I really doubt most people have a clue how massive.
BTW I reject the idea that people who are doing little more than paragraphs, italics and links can't learn to push buttons on a toolbar and then click preview. Frankly if you don't know how to write HTML you're not going to know what the hell you're doing when you want to create a stylesheet or advanced layouts. The idea that you can actually succeed without any knowledge or that learning the equivalent of a dozen new words is difficult are both sad. What Quanta does well is helps you learn as you go and takes your basic conceptual knowledge and empowers you to perform with the full power of specific knowledge. I want VPL to be the best tool for newbies, but the idea that you can somehow produce anything of quality with zero knowledge is a myth worthy of Microsoft PR and it's produced a lot of garbage on the web. That garbage is why it's so hard to make a browser that delivers a perfect experience.
FWIW visual tools to date have universal failings.
* They are hard coded and inflexible to the DTD so they could not write XHTML Strict. In fact if they are HTML 4.01 Transitional compliant it's likely only the most recent version.
* They completely rewrite the entire file removing all formatting.
* They are pretty much useless if you use PHP or other scripting.
* They rarely produce finished quality results without some manual editing unless you are not all that particular about visual layout.
Our development of VPL has followed our approach to Quanta, which is DTD independent and easily produces compliant mark up. NVU is a glorified HTML mail composer and they've had way more resources than us. It's foundationally ill equiped for an XHTML future. Of course it's target was MS FrontPage. PHP developers prefer Quanta over Dreamweaver side by side... which is an incredible achievement. VPL is NOT the most important part, but we hope to finally get it right by version 4. When we do we will have accomplished something no other visual development tool has by addressing the bullet points above. I hope it gets more recognition than just "oh, it's easy to use now". |
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