Software Review:
Allaire's HomeSite 3.0
Part 1
By Scott Clark
If you’ve read any of my previous HTML authoring software reviews, you’ve probably come to realize that
I’m not really into these supposedly oh-so-fabulous WYSIWYG authoring tools—I like to see my source
code—heck, I like to get in there and roll around in it! I personally feel that if you’re really a
Web developer, you should know your tags, and you should be able to create a page from scratch (using
Notepad or Pico) that looks and works just as well as the ones you made using the latest and greatest
HTML authoring tools.
It’s a lot like mathematics. We could just issue all the children a calculator, as
they’d surely be able to correctly figure out any math problem using it. As a society, however, we’ve
realized that although calculators are a great tool, having the basic skills of mathematics is infinitely
more important and useful in life. In that aspect, HTML is not very different. Learn the basics, then
use a tool to do the job when the opportunity presents itself. When a tool is not to be found, you’ll
still be there, cranking out Web pages.
We’ve already covered the top of the line WYSIWYG HTML editors,
(Microsoft FrontPage 98
and Net Object's Fusion),
and we’ve also shown you an HTML editor (NoteTab Pro)
which, although not the "bottom of the line," lacks some of the aspects of the others, namely a high price and a sluggish, resource hogging interface. With this review of Allaire’s
HomeSite 3.0, we’re going to cover a tool with a little from both worlds. This is a tool for hackers, in
the old sense of the word, meaning those who like to get in there and hack their code, make it as tight
as possible, make it better, actually getting in there and working with the code in a text type editor.
Now that doesn’t mean that HomeSite 3.0 is bare bones…far from it!
Allaire HomeSite 3.0 (final beta)
www.allaire.com
System Requirements
Windows 95 or Windows NT 4.0
Intel 486 or higher
8MB RAM (16MB Recommended)
5MB free hard disk space
CD-ROM drive (for packaged version)
Price
HomeSite 3.0 packaged version $89
HomeSite 3.0 electronic CDROM version $79
HomeSite 2.0/2.5 to 3.0 upgrade $39
Move on to the next part
of the review.
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