Common Spot vs. Contribute

[Anna Peekstok]

Does anyone have any experience with either or both of these software products for allowing non-HTML-savvy people to create and/or update site content without messing up the site's code, styles, accessibility, etc.?

CommonSpot -- http://www.paperthin.com/Products/Index.cfm
Contribute -- http://www.macromedia.com/software/contribute/

[Chaos]

I applaude you attempts to get good info before choosing. I am here to submit my "biased" opinion. MacroMedia doesn't get into things halfway, typically their ventures are solid from the get go. While I have not used the product, nor have I introduced it here at my company, I can tell that after evaluating it with Macromedia I was impressed with their attempt to bring some harmony to the often messy world of technical vs. non-technocal folks who so often times share the duties of web maintenance...content or otherwise.

Hope that helps.

Chaos

[Compguy Pete]

I did evaluate Contribute... as an alternative to showing my client to edit their own pages quickly without bother me for minor changes and updates. I agree Macromedia created a hell of a tool.

However...

I think the learning curve is much too high for most users. This are not nearly as easy to use as I would have hoped it would have been. I was hoping for a Photoshop Elements type of Dreamweaver product out of Contribute.

For me FrontPage sadly is still the tool of choice I offer to the site owner who wants to edit his/her site. Its as easy to use as MS word with the interface people know and can use.

[Vchat20]

actually, when I first started getting into html, I used Evrsoft's 1stpage2000 . youcan find it HERE (http://www.evrsoft.com/)