# what's iWeb like for building a website



## morghana (Jan 13, 2006)

Hi.....i just saw it's possible to build a site and not be obliged to publish it as a mac account -  can upload to a server

Has anyone used it.   Any feedback welcome
I noticed it has 3 limitations

If you don't publish your site to .Mac, these features are unavailable:

Password protection
Hit counter
Slideshow with viewing controls

I need a password protected area on my site and hit counter. Is there a way to add these


thankyou


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## Giaguara (Jan 13, 2006)

Those are normally set by isp - or by something else.
Try getting some third party hit counter.


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## ecirtap (Jan 14, 2006)

If your webserver is running on Apache, you can set up pasword protection from there. (My beloved webhost, http://www.dreamhost.com, let you do this in their control panel.)

A bit off-topic, but FYI: hit counters are in the industry considered a no-no (if they are displayed to the site visitors).

patrice
http://www.patriceschneider.com/apple-osx/blog/


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## mdnky (Jan 14, 2006)

The code output by iWeb is almost as nasty as that output by FrontPage.  Definitely not a good thing, but it could be worse I guess.

There's tons of ways to password protect a page, the manner in which you choose just depends on what you're trying to accomplish.  For simple things, a .htaccess based password (Apache based servers) might be sufficient.  

As far as a slideshow, there's probably a comparable script out there that'll do something similar.  Coppermine is a photo gallery script that has a slideshow feature built-in.  To make transfers easy there is a plug-in called CopperExport which allows you to directly transfer photos from iPhoto into the CopperMine galleryworks great.


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## Thank The Cheese (Jan 14, 2006)

ecirtap said:
			
		

> ...My beloved webhost, http://www.dreamhost.com, let you do this in their control panel...



Hey ecirtap. I'm actually looking for a web host at the moment. I had a look at Dreamhost's site. Some freakin amazing deals. actually, seems a little too good to be true. Are there any hidden charged, contracts, or limitations that aren't obvious?

I mean, 20GB storage, unlimited databases, a free domain...all 7.95 per month?! And the sorage space goes up 160MB per week, too! That's _sounds_ dodgy. 

Are they above board?





			
				mdnky said:
			
		

> The code output by iWeb is almost as nasty as that output by FrontPage.  Definitely not a good thing, but it could be worse I guess.



Well, any auto-generated HTML is going to challenge web standards. Do they use tables or CSS? please tell me it doesn't generate tables. please!!



as for the hitcounter...unless your website is a tribute to the 1990's, dont use them.


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## ecirtap (Jan 15, 2006)

Hi "Thank The Cheese"

>Hey ecirtap. I'm actually looking for a web host at the moment. I had a 
>look at Dreamhost's site. Some freakin amazing deals. actually, seems a 
>little too good to be true. Are there any hidden charged, contracts, or 
>limitations that aren't obvious?

Believe me: no hidden charges, nothing. (They'll only start charging extra if you go over your bandwidth limit and the likes: like any other webhost.)

Also, the domain you register is *owned by you*, not by them! (A lot of the dodgy webhosts offer free domain-registration, but register it in their name, so if you ever want to move to another host, you'll have to buy the domain off them!)

The Dreamhost people are really cool; plus the customer support is also good - you will usually get a reply within less than 24 hours. (Sometimes they are even online and you can IM with them!)

>I mean, 20GB storage, unlimited databases, a free domain...all 7.95 per 
>month?! And the sorage space goes up 160MB per week, too! That's 
>sounds dodgy. 

They do come up with all those weird deals, but they are for real!

The best thing also: you have a 97-day money back guarantee!!! So, nothing to lose, really...!

>Are they above board?

I have been with them for more than 2 years, and so far been very happy.

Not too long ago they changed the deal to "unlimited websites/URLs per account" (I am hosting 10+ URLs in the one account), so I wanted to move all my stuff over from account number 2 to account number 1, so I'd have only one account, which they said they'd do for me at $ 100/hour - eventually they did it: for free!!! (I only had to upload the websites data via FTP again, but all mail accounts, etc. they moved over for me, no re-configuring necessary.) 

In case you do decide to sign up with dreamhost.com, you could do me a huge favour and do so via my rewards link:

http://www.dreamhost.com/rewards.cgi?ecirtap

Even if you do not want to do so via my rewards link: I can still recommend them big time!

If you need more info: let me know.

patrice


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## mdnky (Jan 15, 2006)

Thank The Cheese said:
			
		

> Well, any auto-generated HTML is going to challenge web standards. Do they use tables or CSS? please tell me it doesn't generate tables. please!!



Its CSS based, but its nasty looking; and semantics aren't just thrown out the window...they're launched somewhere into another galaxy.  There's actually a few Mac based programs like this already and their code, while not perfect, is way better.  I'd say they either rushed it to get it out, or they didn't even consider the issues such things cause.

Example pages from iWeb:  

 http://theubergeeks.net/iweb/Welcome.html
 http://theubergeeks.net/iweb/Blog/Blog.html
 http://macteens.com/media/iWeb/macteensBlogTest/Blog 2/Blog 2.html
 http://web.mac.com/samkass/iWeb/DBADA31D-DF79-4647-A0B5-880D7D1BF7E1/Playing With Tech/Archive.html
 http://web.mac.com/bryanhooper/iWeb/FB57BAD6-C937-47E9-A288-3E920FCD893A/Welcome.html
 http://web.mac.com/samkass/iWeb/DBA...ech/6330CF04-2B4F-4334-B7D0-951F20CD6B8D.html

Some reviews:

 http://whatdoiknow.org/archives/002582.shtml
 http://businesslogs.com/technology/iwebgenerated_source_code_is_awful.php


On a side note...there is a program out there that seems to have been around for a while going by the name of iWeb Composer.  Wonder what they think about it...


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## Thank The Cheese (Jan 15, 2006)

*@ ecirtap*

thanks for the info!   I'll most certainly use the rewards link and refer you if I sign up with them. Would never have known about them if it weren't for your post. 


*@ mdnky*

good lord, you weren't kidding about the messy code mdnky. Seems to create new DIVs for every paragraph, and re-define all the styles each time. There is 5 times the amount of code there should be (at least)

This site, for example, uses *54* individual DIVs...it could have been done with 2!

I stand corrected. :/


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## mdnky (Jan 15, 2006)

Yup...it surprised me too when I first saw it (the sheer number of divs used and the inline styles, no semantics at all, etc.).  Try viewing those pages in Firefox with styles turned off...not good.


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## mattsuzu (Jan 21, 2006)

Wow, my 56k dialup didn't like all that code so much!

The only true way to write a website is in pure code, i can only really ywrite html and a bit of css but i find its the true control. If you're doing alot of web browsing - check out peoples source codes and you'll start to see how things work...

Do a bit of research on the topic and you'll be writing your page in BB-edit lite in no time.

Also, on another note - something i'ive been working on... It would be cool to get some feedback from other people on this one! Bare in mind its not finished yet!!!

http://www.coffscomputing.com.au/dziin/home.html


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## fryke (Jan 21, 2006)

iWeb is nice for those who just don't care. If you have a digital camera, no interest in computers whatsoever and want to publish your stuff to some relatives with broadband access, iWeb and .mac is surely an easy path to follow, and the result looks nice on current browsers. But that's basically it.


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