The first iteration of iWeb ( ) appeared a little more than a year and a one-half ago , render iLife user a quick room to publish Web sites via their .Mac accounts . project with family users in idea , iWeb took the guesswork out of World Wide Web publication . Without any knowledge of HTML , CSS , or JavaScript , entanglement novices could bring out place varlet as well as beautiful , professional - expect on-line photo record album and video pages , and get set out with elementary blogging and podcasting .
However , the program had some famous flaw : it was a less intuitive procedure to publish to non-.Mac Web host ; it lean to create figure of speech - heavy ( slow ) pages ; it did n’t allow for loose web site synchronisation between unlike Macs ; and it gave drug user no easy way to add custom HTML to their pages .
In iWeb ’ 08 , Apple has concentrated primarily on improving its photo gallery functionality , incorporate community - oriented feature for sharing and feedback , and adding World Wide Web 2.0 applied science that make your Web site an interactive and engaging experience . Some of the old flaw continue , and at least one seems worse .
Plays well with iLife
In iWeb , you utilize the media web web browser to get at any photograph , audio cartridge clip , or picture clipping created in or imported into another iLife software , and quickly drag it into an iWeb varlet guide . With iMovie , you must first share the video to the media internet browser before you could access it from iWeb ’s medium internet browser . From iPhoto , you could send photograph directly to an iWeb photo page or web log entering Thomas Nelson Page by using the dictation in the Share carte du jour .
One click to the Web
So , allow ’s say you ’ve assembled your photo record album in iPhoto ( ) , cut your videos in iMovie ( ) , and composed your podcasts in GarageBand ( ) . Now the head is , how do you share all of this material with your friend and family ?
In iWeb , pages seem to build themselves . Just choose a topic ( from the 26 provided ) and Sir Frederick Handley Page template ( such as picture , flick , web log , or podcast , some of which are pre - coded to bring out rich medium ) , draw and drop images and other media you want to use into the guide ’s procurator , character in your own text edition , and you ’re quick to release . All you have to do is click the Publish button in the bottom left - hand corner of the iWeb windowpane , and within a myopic while everyone can see your website on the Web .
iWeb ’ 08 comes with eight beautiful raw themes ( 14 if you did n’t get the iWeb 1.1 update ) . However , if you customise your Web pages extensively in the previous version , be aware that iWeb ’ 08 reapplies default translation of the themes , which may cause your well - crafted page to go skew-whiff . Make certain to duplicate any pageboy , or better , the whole site ( replicate the file : Library / app Support / iWeb / Domain.sites ) before use a new paper . Apple has release an update to iWeb ’ 08 to avail address this problem .
It is also possible to make your own iWeb report or purchase third - party theme ( although third - party iWeb ’ 06 templates ( version 1.0.1 ) will not work in ’ 08 ) . That enunciate , iWeb does not right away support import idea , and adding them requires knowledge of how to cut the iWeb software package ( if the template installers betray ) . Within iWeb , you may take a Blank templet ( a newfangled pageboy style in iWeb ’ 08 ) , tailor-make it , and keep your invention for future use , but you will have to use the twinned function to create new page . In plus , marketer such as11mystics.com , are already update their iWeb 1.x templates for translation 2.x . Most iWeb users starve variety , but will be improbable to take the time and travail to make or bribe additional templates .
To keep things as simple and versatile as possible , iWeb automates some more - ripe functionality , such as image optimization . This is a threefold - edged sword , though , since for achieve many of the effects needed for its varlet designs ( which often use masking , transparency , reflexion , and rotary motion ) , iWeb uses the PNG-24 format alternatively of the more - efficient JPEG image data formatting . This can intend large trope size and slower Thomas Nelson Page downloads . For example , to make a non - rectangular photograph in one of the template aim , iWeb outputs a 328 KB PNG-24 range . If you take that same image and spare it as a JPEG at 100 percent quality , the sizing is reduced to 134 KB , and you’re able to get a much smaller file size if you reduce the tone even slightly . Of course , then you wo n’t be able to reproduce the ornamental image frame . The tradeoff for conception is often gravid page size and irksome downloads — a common complaint about iWeb .
Media mogul
Another problem arises if you are work across multiple Macs . You may have a abode automobile , a work political machine , and a laptop computer , all grooving off of the same .Mac account to keep them in sync . Unfortunately , when it comes to iWeb , none of these machine will know what the other is up to . There is a workaround , but it need that you manually copy the Domain.sites2 Indian file ( User / Library / software Support / iWeb ) and hold it around with you , or copy it to your iDisk . Of course , that intend always having to remember to re-create the data file , when Apple could have allowed for synchronise in the .Mac preferences just like it does for Mail , Address Book , and other applications .
Galleries galore
One trouble with the premature version of iWeb was managing all of your photo album and movies . You could create piles of dissimilar album and movies for various upshot ( one for your shaver ’s natal day , one for your beach vacation ) but to keep track of them , you had to manually make and deal an index page . The young variant of iWeb automatically indexes all of the exposure albums you send into a My Albums directory — and each has an animated screen . A photo album can contain up to 500 images , and you could define how many images appear on each page .
Web widgets
The vane is full of gismo — little chunk of codification that anyone can employ on their web site to add depicted object and functionality without deliver to write computer code themselves . You do n’t have to be a programmer to copy and paste connection code from YouTube , MySpace , and other social networking connection sites to append television , RSS feed , or mathematical function to your entanglement pages . novel in iWeb ’ 08 is the ability to total three different spirit of Web appliance to your pages .
HTML Snippets grant you to simulate Web computer code ( HTML , CSS , or JavaScript ) from any entanglement site and paste it into a level on your Thomas Nelson Page , which you’re able to then position wherever you want it . This can be used to add a telecasting , parentage ticker , atmospheric condition function , or news headlines updated live on your vane page . Of course , if you love any code , HTML Snippets can be used to sum whatever code you want to your page . Go crazy .
Web Galleries are photo record album or videos that can be print forthwith from iPhoto or iMovie to be viewed on your .Mac account or your own arena . The .Mac Web Gallery feature film allows iLife users to get content online fast without using iWeb . However , iWeb allow you to contribute a miniskirt - version of any of these Web Galleries to a page on your site as a Web widget with a link to the full photo picture gallery or TV . The interface for the pic mini - drift may take some getting used to — you have to roll your black eye back and forth over the image as it changes , much like the prevue in an iPhoto event , only minor . And the small size of it is a problem because even the slightest movement of the mouse initiates the skimming action . However , the interface for the full drift makes up for that .
Keep in mind , though , that the Web Galleries generated from iPhoto and iMovie are different from photo albums and television pageboy created by iWeb . Web Galleries take you straight into a robust image - range interface using Flash , while iWeb creates hypertext markup language pages with photo and videos on them and a link to a more modified browsing interface .
Master of your own domain? Maybe.
One of the most eagerly look new feature film in iWeb is the power to consider your .Mac iWeb site by type in your own registered arena name ( for lesson ,
If this sounds confusing , that ’s because it is . Even if you have some experience with your sphere recorder ’s control dialog box , changing the alias may prove an imposing task . Then too , many iWeb users may not even know who their land registrar is or evenwhatone is . My main issue with the Personal Domain feature is that it places the load of get the shift on the user , and it is far from a square process . Because place up domain promotion require dealing with the arcane underbelly of domain registrars , it can be a more puzzling physical process than anything else you ’ll do in iWeb . Apple could help by publishing more exhaustive instructions on how to set it up using the most popular land register services . As it digest , the teaching from Apple are extremely vague , mostly advising you to contact your domain name recorder . They give no indication of what to expect or do if things are n’t work right . Many iWeb users may have their own domains , but I doubt that many of them will be capable to get this functionality working right the first time out — which really should be the banner for a consumer computer programme . Apple has a lot of work to do to smoothen out this process .
Macworld’s buying advice
If you want to build a Web web site to share your sprightliness with friends and folk , then there is no doubt that iWeb ’ 08 will do everything that you need it to do . Its integration with the rest of the iLife suite ensures that it will be the fleet way from your sieve to the screens of others . It also allow for some really prissy new template designs ; unfortunately , getting the correct effects often means have deadening Page . There is no reflexive syncing between your different computers . The new photo drift indexing feature is certain to be a hit with anyone who create more than a few photo albums a class , and you could also apace serve up a mere blog or podcast .
However , if you are an arrangement or small - stage business count for iWeb to do anything more than the basic , and particularly if you are not a .Mac customer , you will be disappointed . The blogging feature still lacks some standard feature find in other common blog products , but it will do for most personal habit . For more advanced exploiter , this version ’s full-grown shortcoming is if you need to publish a site to your own WWW server . You will still have to bring your own FTP software , and you will miss out on many of the potentiality that iWeb offers . Moreover , Apple still has not addressed the problem of pageboy bloat , something that will impress all users no matter how or where they publish their site . And if you ’re OK publishing to .Mac ’s host , but want to apply your own knowledge domain name , ready to do some research and head - scrape to get it all knead .
[ Jason Cranford Teague is the creative director forAOL REDand regularly blog about technology and culture atwebbedENVIRONMENTS.com . ]
