Large Scale Central

Personal Website Issues - ACK!

General Discussion
#1

I’ve been using NetObjects Fusion for over 10 years to maintain my own web site. The last time I upgraded it went smoothly. I’ve been on version 8 for some years now and got an opportunity to get a “free” upgrade to NetObjects 2013 through my service provider.

Well, on December 4, I upgraded to the new version. I should have kept a backup. :frowning:

I’m not sure what possessed me to upgrade, but when I did everything was trashed. It took well over an hour to upload my site (about 150 pages or so), and when it “finished” it told me that some files (like 600 or so), could not be uploaded. No error #, no explanation of what happened. Foolishly, I kept trying to solve the problem, but didn’t make any progress at all.

Not good.

I started looking around and found a number of alternatives. I downloaded a demo of SiteSpinner and almost bought it - but something held me back. It looked like there was still a lot of work to do in setting up menus and images. More research seemed necessary. BTW, I had/have NO desire to learn HTML, in spite of the fact that many people think this is the ONLY way to do a website.

I stumbled upon another demo of Website X5. Wow. I was hooked. I went from a Model T to a modern sports car.

Anyway, apologies to the one or two folks that have tried to use my web site in the past few weeks.

I started converting on Tuesday (12/17) and have completed the locomotives and rolling stock sections. Still working on structures, but getting there.

Website X5 has some neat features that has me including a LOT more pictures of my builds.

It updates in minutes instead of hours and makes updating my website a LOT easier.

#2

I’m running NOF11 and I always stick with what works until such time as they offer a real “must have” and then I read the problem posts on the fora first, prior to deciding. I have no problem with others being on the bleeding edge.

#3

Hans-Joerg Mueller said:

I’m running NOF11 and I always stick with what works until such time as they offer a real “must have” and then I read the problem posts on the fora first, prior to deciding. I have no problem with others being on the bleeding edge.

Yeah, but you’re much smarter than I am. :wink:

Anyway, I’m VERY surprised at how much easier Website X5 is to use than NOF. It would probably be even better if I took time to read the docs…

#4

Bruce Chandler said:

.…

Yeah, but you’re much smarter than I am. :wink:

Not smarter, just extremely cautious.

#5

Are there demo programs for either of these mentioned?

I used to maintain the Vermont Garden Railway Society web pages using HTML using straight HTML and Coffee Cup Free editions of HTML and FTP.

Difficult to maintain, AND expand the way the officers wanted to upgrade.

Weebly was suggested and that is what we are now using: vgrs.us

Has lots of ease of creation methods.

Can even create copies for testing without registering them somehow.

Downsides = CONS:

Not particularly friendly for HTML page insertion.

PDFs and DOCS and other pages use a different service and seem to be sluggish in displaying.

I can’t find out how to change the line width to allow separating the items on the Events page-I’d like it REALLY dark, black, and bold.

Xmas trees for 2013 is a little set of pics and links at the end of the Events 2013 page

http://www.vgrs.us/2013-events.html at the very end.

#6

Sorry can’t find anything except

http://netobjects.com/html/free-website-design-software.html

for NOF Essentials.

NOF used to have a trial period i.e. use the full version for 30 days (if I remember correctly) and then decide if it’s good enough.

PS my hobby website’s page count is at 351 and growing. I don’t even want to think about redesigning with a different program.

BTW I tried the “import existing website” routine once when someone wanted a new design. Mind you the original was designed on a MAC and the importing results were … (insert your favourite blue sentence).

#7

Thanks Hans.

I’ve downloaded and installed it.

I’ll work with it another day.

Nothing more to do to it until 2014 Events need correcting and updating.

#8

I would not recommend changing design tools. Though I have been able to cut and paste between them, it’s still a lot of work. Plus, I am changing my design a bit as I really like the new software. But, if I could have got it to work, I would have stayed with it.

#9

I’m on a Mac so I have iWeb, and love it. Incredibly easy to use and I can still edit the html if I want to – which so far I’ve only done to add in snippets of special code as needed.

#10

Bruce,
I used NOF for years maintaining a bunch of real-estate websites - mostly because the photo gallery feature created all the property photo pages for me.

I had some problems upgrading over the years - I’m now on v11. They advise exporting a special format and then importing it to the new version. Sorry you got caught.
Edit: I looked it up - you export as a ‘template’. From the manual: " Exporting a site as a template is the only way to share sites with other NetObjects Fusion developers or to combine sites. You cannot simply copy the .nod file and assets from one computer to another". I successfully upgraded several times, and moved the sites to new computers over the years.

I was always annoyed by the ‘import existing page’ option, which didn’t import half the pages I wanted!