HomeSite: When no-code isn't enough

I admit it: this entire sight is built on hypocrisy. Although it reviews and lauds the latest generation of no-code Web publishing tools, Lighthouse on the Web is built in raw HyperText Mark-up Language (HTML). And while the Lighthouse computer bulges with copies of the latest programs from Microsoft and Corel and Claris, the program which contributes the most to its construction is a highly sophisticated piece of shareware - an HTML editor called HomeSite. So now, breaking all the rules, the brief story of HomeSite and the man who made it.

Truth is, Homesite exists largely because cartoonists draw such lousy wages.

As a journalism student, American Nick Bradbury penned cartoons for his college newspaper, and then for a local newspaper. His favorite was a strip called Dexter. But as he puts it, "the pay was so bad that I had to work at a deli on the side in order to keep a roof over my head". When he followed his girlfriend (now his wife) from Tennessee to Washington, Bradbury swapped the salami counter for a temporary job in data processing. "After the work day was done I would hang around and teach myself how to use PCs. It was only a matter of time before I got sucked into the world of computer programming and dropped cartooning altogether."

Nick Bradbury was hooked.

When the Web phenomenon arrived in 1995, Bradbury, then 27, "barely knew how to spell HTML". But he decided to put those Dexter cartoons on-line. At the time, plenty of Web site creators used simple text editors like Windows Notepad to write their HTML (HyperText Markup Language, the language Web browsers speak). No-code Web publishers like Microsoft's Frontpage were still on the drawing boards, but HTML-writing assistants like Hot Dog were popping up. Bradbury editioned all of them, and didn't like what he saw. So he sat down with a copy of Borland's then shiny new programming software, Delphi 2.0, and wrote his own Windows 95 Web editor.

Nick Bradbury had long mused about writing commercial software eventually. "But funnily enough," he reflects now, "I didn't really write HomeSite with this in mind. I really did start off just writing something for myself".

Leaving Hot Dog cold

From the day it snuck onto the Internet - April 21, 1996 - HomeSite gained followers fast. Some had struggled with the annoying eccentricities of the leading Web editor, Melbourne-based Sausage Software's pioneering Hot Dog. Says Bradbury of his rival: "I think for now HotDog is a serious competitor because it has so much momentum ... HotDog actually started out as a good product, but the developers started focusing on style instead of substance and ended up alienating many of their users."

Many users soon came to admire the speed with which Bradbury, a lightning-fast code writer, improved his product; new, free and perfectly stable updates often appeared just weeks after their predecessors, brandishing new features such as spell-checking, extended search-and-replace and undo, and impressive JavaScript support. (Bradbury claimed modestly that he'd been "disappointed at how slow it's gone".) While you worked in the simple HTML code, you could check your pages' appearance almost instantly in an internal browser. Bradbury, a one-man operation, made a point of intelligently expanding his program by integrating other high-quality freeware and shareware tools, such as the CSE 3310 HTML Validator, Stephen LeHunte's definitive HTML Reference Library, and Microsoft's Web Publishing Wizard.

And the product has always been astonishingly cheap. Version 1.2 remains a free download, and even after recent price rises less than $US50 (payable by credit card over the Net) buys you registration of the much more powerful version 2.0 and the right to permanently install Bradbury's never-ending series of updates.

Power you can use

But most of all, HomeSite has always made its users feel at home. Bradbury built his program around a multi-tabbed toolbar which put all the basics on big, clear buttons, but left the more sophisticated code just a click away, producing a product easier to use than to describe.

Web editing software litters the Net, and a feature which appears in one editor soon appears in others. Hot Dog now features a tabbed interface rather like HomeSite's, just as Bradbury's internal browser came along just after Hot Dog's. But the sheer pleasure of using HomeSite has defied its rivals' attempts at mimicry. Says Bradbury: "The user interface is by far the most important part of any piece of software, but I don't think the developer community fully realizes this yet." Comments at Web discussion forums such as Stroud's shareware list confirm that users see it his way - and with unusual loyalty.

You might think cartoonist Bradbury's artistic instincts and training lie behind HomeSite's sweet interface. The man himself, though, traces his concentration on ease-of-use back to his first job in computing. "For almost a year," he recalls, "I spent several hours a day working with this terrible interface, and during those hours it became my work environment. This bad interface actually affected my quality of life. I would go home frustrated after wrestling with the thing."

Growing pains

In some recent beta versions of HomeSite, a series of unpublished keystrokes triggered a short, aggressive animation - the HomeSite logo dropping down to squash Hot Dog's canine mascot. But Bradbury sees shareware like Hot Dog as yesterday's competition. Simple Web page creation is now a task mainly for no-code Web publishers from software giants like Microsoft, Corel and Adobe. "If all you want to do is quickly put together a set of pages, something like FrontPage is a better choice than HomeSite," Bradbury notes. Tools like HomeSite remain essential for Web authors wanting real control over their pages. But to keep growing, HomeSite will have to support ever more sophisticated Website needs, such as corporate database integration.

Right now, Homesite's most obvious shortcoming is its relatively unsophisticated site-management. "In a small way I've already started adding some site management features," says Bradbury, "but this is one area that I will focus on much more in the next version. There are actually some good site management products on the market right now, but I think they suffer from some serious usability problems. They also have a very narrow target - usually large, corporate sites. I don't think they fit the needs of the majority of web developers, especially since they don't include HTML editing capabilities."

In less than a year, the Web has made the former deli assistant ... well, perhaps not rich, but "quite comfortable". "The Internet really levels the playing field, so that people who create programs out of their apartments can compete with the 'big guys'. The cost of distribution, which used to keep most people out of the market, is now negligible."

But one-man operations can't forever. Running the HomeSite business was robbing Bradbury of the time to much-needed time to improve his product. So in March, Bradbury lived the 1990s independent software creator's dream and sold HomeSite for an undisclosed sum to Allaire, creator of the Cold Fusion Web database program. Bradbury will keep developing HomeSite. His users are hoping it will retain its remarkable charms.

The HTML Editors' Battle: An Update After emerging as a serious contender in the HTML editing stakes over the past six months, HomeSite is now embroiled in controversy. New owner Allaire corporation, having promised to keep it as the cheapest such tool on the market, has raised its price to $US79 - higher than it looks, since HomeSite relies on outside tools for tasks such as HTML validation and heavy-duty FTP work. The users who so loyally followed HomeSite when it was being personally developed by cartoonist and software writer extraordinaire are now rebelling, live on the Web, at Allaire's own HomeSite forum. This strife means good luck for troubled Sausage Software, which is hoping to gain the HTML-editor ascendancy once again with version 4.0 of the world's most-used editing tool, Hot Dog. The Dog comes with its own price rise - to $US129. But Sausage says the new product features an updated interface, support for version 4.0 browser tags, a "rich editing window", more wizards and a "Supertoolz" plug-in architecture which allows you to integrate separate programs into Hot Dog. It also bundles a collection of other Sausage Web software into the deal, and offers upgrades to existing users.

Nick Bradbury's HomeSite site allows you to read reviews and order the product. HomeSite - available only for Windows 95 and NT - costs $US39.95, about $A50, and can be ordered over the Web with credit card payment, or with a faxed order form. The freeware version, while less powerful, naturally needs no payment. And of course, you can try the more powerful full version before you buy ...

This instructive side-by-side page contrasts the responses of HomeSite and Hot Dog users in the on-line conferencing area of Stroud's CWS Apps List

Guides to using HomeSite come from academic Robert Crooks

And the Dexter cartoons that started it all are still on the Web, just in case you wondered.

Download HomeSite 2.5 final release from Allaire (1.64Mb file)

Download HomeSite 2.0 final release from Allaire (1.11Mb file - this program will ask you to register)

Download HomeSite 1.2 free version from Allaire (504 kb file ) This file is true freeware but lacks several more advanced features, such as right-click editing and project management. In April 1997 it ranked number 31 on ZDNet's list of most popular downloads.

And Hot Dog 4.0 can also be downloaded for a 14-day trial.

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