Building a website these days is easier than ever, thanks to the proliferation of free tools. From WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) editors to full content management systems like WordPress, you can make a great-looking website without spending a dime on software. (Granted, the paid tools tend to be better…but then, that’s why they cost hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars!)
Here are a few of the tools you can use to build your own website.
If you want a WYSIWYG editor, KompoZer has been getting a lot of testimonials lately; it’s a free (open source) web editor that works on all major platforms. KompoZer is designed for the complete novice, who wants to build a website without knowing any HTML coding.
For people who don’t mind writing the code themselves, there are several great text editors that have syntax coloring, making your coding easier. My personal favorite is EditPad, which I’ve been using since the 90s; unfortunately, to get the most useful options you have to upgrade to EditPad Pro for $50. Still the lite version lets you see if you like the software and is a pretty good text editor on its own. It does suffer from being Windows only.
Another popular editor, which works on MacOS and Linux as well as Windows, is Bluefish. Like EditPad, Bluefish contains syntax coloring for a variety of different language; unlike EditPad, it’s totally free, being released under the GPL. Rather than being a pure text editor, it offers a WYSIWYN (What You See Is What You Need) interface that allows you to drop frequently used items into your code from the toolbar.