What web design software do i need

mikeopvc · 16 October 2009 at 2:17PM

I would like to build my own website but am not sure how to go about it, my brother in-law has made a start for me and has even made the website live but it needs a lot more stuff adding to it.

He now has a new job and is likely to be very busy so I don't want to burden him and to be honest i quite like the idea of learning to do it myself.

He uses photoshop and sitegrinder but I don't have either of these, are they expensive and where would be the best place to get them?

I recently bought office enterprise for my son from SOFTWARE FOR STUDENTS and noticed they sell some web design software on there too such as but I don't know what's best for me.

Anyway enough rambling I'm really just fishing for advice here so if anyone can help that would be great.

thanks

isofa · 16 October 2009 at 2:34PM

A professional would use Dreamweaver and possibly the full CS web suite from Adobe, you are talking £1000+ and also, unless you are familiar with design software, a huge learning curve. Also you'll need to understand HTML and Javascript too, as adjusting the code directly is often the best method.

If you are very new to this, I'd sign up for some courses. Especially n newer technology such as CSS.

Personally I use Photoshop for all image creation, Dreamweaver and Flash for site design, and a myriad of other tools for bits and pieces.

You will not be able to use your son's student status to buy software to use for commercial purposes.

If you want a free web-design package, Kompozer is good (so I've heard) and there are plenty of free image editors like Paint.Net and The GIMP...

zee_2 · 16 October 2009 at 10:21PM

try
http://www.freeserifsoftware.com/ sales allways have offers ,ie.web plus 10 £9.99 plus postage with extra disc and very good book , have used them since web plus 5 , the software is great and under rated ,used by a lot of pro's too.

richt71 · 16 October 2009 at 10:27PM

I'd suggest you look at wordpress. Yes wordpress is a blog but you can turn it into a static website. There's software pretty cheap to do this if you don't want to manually code it.
You have the advantage of google liking wordpress (at the moment) so it can help with SEO.

Oliver89 · 16 October 2009 at 10:27PM

yeah GIMP is a open source software which will be an alternative for photoshop. http://www.gimp.org/

anotherbigspender · 16 October 2009 at 10:41PM

richt71 wrote: »

I'd suggest you look at wordpress. Yes wordpress is a blog but you can turn it into a static website. There's software pretty cheap to do this if you don't want to manually code it.
You have the advantage of google liking wordpress (at the moment) so it can help with SEO.

In simple terms (I am a novice when it comes to web site building), what would I need to do to Worpress to use it to create a static website? I was planning on using it to build an information source and RSVP tool for my wedding guests.

crampo_2 · 16 October 2009 at 10:53PM

whats the website for?

faevilangel · 16 October 2009 at 11:03PM

anotherbigspender wrote: »

In simple terms (I am a novice when it comes to web site building), what would I need to do to Worpress to use it to create a static website? I was planning on using it to build an information source and RSVP tool for my wedding guests.

You need to go into the admin panel, go to settings (bottom of list) then reading, then change the homepage option to a static page. You need to have built a page before, i just create a quick simeple page that says welcome. The page then will show in the dropbox

In regards to building a website, there is no tools that make a good webdesigner. Photoshop, flash and fireworks are brilliant for the actual design and actual parts of the site but putting the website into a structure is better left to knowing the code.

The amount of times I get people ask me to upgrade their current site, which has been built by dreamweaver and is so horrible that I just recode the whole site.

I do recommend learning the code yourself as dreamweaver can be bloated and takes 10x longer to build a site than writing the code yourself.

Use https://www.w3schools.com, look through Html and CSS as that's all you do really need to know, but when working with wordpress, a php knowledge is helpful but not necessary.

To code a design to wordpress, use http://www.wpdesigner.com/2007/02/19/so-you-want-to-create-wordpress-themes-huh/

It's easy to do if you know html and css

Good luck

cliffsull09 · 16 October 2009 at 11:15PM

Coffecup is an html editor and can be downloaded as a 28 day trial from their website....I found it useful when I first started out...perhaps you will too?However, if you get a site with nsDesign , there are inbuilt web sites under the control panel...mine was built on one of these platforms...see it here www-pc-insecurities-com

Robin_T_Cox · 17 October 2009 at 11:39AM

Nowadays most web sites are built using a Content Management System, such as Joomla or Drupal. See:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_content_management_system
http://www.joomla.org/about-joomla.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drupal
Both are free open source applications. Of the two, Joomla is probably the easiest to learn. There is a comparison of each here:
http://www.alledia.com/blog/general-cms-issues/joomla-and-drupal-which-one-is-right-for-you/

mikeopvc · 17 October 2009 at 12:05PM

crampo wrote: »

whats the website for?

Double glazing,
I don't think i'll bother now.
It all seems a bit too techie for me, at present all I have to do is design a page using publisher then email it to my bro in-law who then turns it into a webpage.

thanks

What web design software do i need

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