Navigator Gold 3.0 charts its own course

When Netscape's most recent no-code Web page maker appeared on the scene last September, it arrived like an unsuspecting civilian strolling onto a battlefield. A new brigade of sophisticated authoring tools had stormed across the Web in mid-1996, from the professional-level Hot Dog to the professional-looking Microsoft FrontPage 1.1 and the freeware GNNPress (soon to become AOLPress).

Into this scene wandered Navigator Gold 3.0 (NavGold to its friends). The program still labored under a name that suggested a hotted-up Web browser rather than a page creation tool. And version 3.0 merely corrected the obvious deficiencies of NavGold 2.0, rather than taking a quantum leap. In the exploding Web scene of late 1996, some reviewers suddenly insisted on frames and image-maps and forms and JavaScript - features Netscape had in some cases invented, but which NavGold still didn't handle well. "Gold just feels incomplete", complained c|net's frustrated reviewer, in a Web thumbs-down. Suddenly the biggest name in browsers was an also-ran in the Web page editing stakes.

I was one of the throng who passed by NavGold's release in blissful ignorance. I had already dipped a toe in the Web page waters with GNNPress, dived into learning HTML-driven publishing and acquired a copy of HomeSite, a sophisticated Hot Dog rival with a beautifully smooth user interface. I didn't know that NavGold created Web pages. I didn't know that it came integrated into the familiar Navigator browser. And I didn't know that it was free for personal use, a fact which some media appeared not to understand. (In strict legal terms, individuals and charities get an "unlimited evaluation", just as they do for the Netscape browser. Companies must pay.)

But all that was four months ago - an age on the Web. In early 1997, the enthusiasm for frames and image-maps has quite properly ebbed. At the same time, the Web itself continues to attract more interest every day. And the truth is, if you want a moderate but serious-looking Web presence, NavGold may well suit you far better than fancier, costlier programs. At the very least, unless you can afford to waste a couple of hundred dollars, you should consider downloading NavGold 3.0 to familiarise yourself with Web page authoring before you pay for something else.

Editing without pain

When you start it up, Navigator Gold looks just like plain old Navigator - except that the toolbar sports a new "edit" button. Hit that, and you're taken to the Web page design program proper, with a 3-line array of buttons for creating page elements.

NavGold's most useful characteristic may be its gentle learning curve. You can venture out of the familiar Navigator browser to create your first page in minutes using a "wizard" located on the Netscape site. Once you feel more confident, you can adapt pre-built page templates, also from the Netscape site. Finally, you can create your own pages, with advice from sites like Netscape and Lighthouse on the Web.

Navgold's tools for creating links, importing graphics, formatting text and creating basic tables are extremely simple, even if they don't give you the control or functions of many other tools. The program presents a rough but usually serviceable facsimile of the way in which your page will present in commonly-used browsers. The most obvious omission is the lack of an e-mail tag, which allows Web authors to get single-click e-mail response from readers.

You can get surprisingly powerful results by combining NavGold with a few pieces of widely-available shareware, such as graphics powerhouse Paint Shop Pro, form creator WebForms and upload programs FTP Explorer or Cute FTP (NavGold has a button for uploading your pages in a single click, but most Internet Service Providers don't support it.) And if you want serious support, you can get it, albeit at a serious price, with Netscape Press's unusually readable "Official Netscape Navigator Gold 3.0 Book". It includes all of the most desirable shareware on a CD.

Neglected NavGold

Netscape no longer wants to make NavGold a sophisticated tool; indeed, it seems to have almost given up on it as a Web authoring program. The company's own excellent on-line introduction to the product calls it "the premiere client for Intranet use" (author's italics), echoing recent company statements. (For some of us, this just confirms that Netscape is losing touch, since intranets typically possess the bandwidth to support many of the multimedia features which NavGold doesn't support.)

However, NavGold will improve slowly. The newest version, now called Composer and integrated into Netscape's new (and still buggy) Communicator package, will support font faces and drag-and-drop image manipulation (though there's still no sign of form support). You can find out about Composer's beta release at Netscape's site.

The best alternative to NavGold for beginners is the excellent AOLPress (downloadable from this site). If your ISP allows them, AOLPress creates forms; it also supports Java applets, creates image maps and represents your pages slightly better. But NavGold scores with its easy-start wizard and its superior outside documentation. You can download it from Netscape anytime.

NavGold isn't fancy. It isn't cool. But as a path into Web page creation, it doesn't deserve to be overlooked.

previous | contents | next
Lighthouse on the Web: http://werple.net.au/~dwalker/

You can e-mail the author