This is the "Question of the Month" Page. This page contains the question that was posted by one of our subscribers, and of course the answer that question from Andrew, The Computer Consultant.

This question was posted by Brenda McKean. Brenda works in a computer lab and teaches others how to properly use computers. Brenda writes,
"Andrew, I have a website that I have designed using a 'drag and drop' graphical page builder. I have heard from others that these type of applications can put so much repeated code in that is not at all necessary. Is this true? And also, I was wondering where I can learn at least some of the basics about HTML programming. I would like to be able to know what I am looking at when it comes to seeing all the code.

Brenda, thank you so much for writing, you are the very first person to have a question chosen for our "Question of the Month"
Brenda, that is absolutely correct. I have tried alot of the so called 'do it all for you' webpage design applications. Please do not get me wrong, or take this the wrong way. There are alot of Great editors on the market today that will do most or even all of the web design work for you. And for all the wonderful people that have never designed a site before, they are really nice. But, back to your question -- There is a price you pay for that ease of use. Usually it is file size, sometimes it is the ease of use itself. Some of the editors want to be too helpful to you, and take all the control away from you.

I have seen people get very frustrated with some of the editors. They will add Code where it is not needed, and duplicate code, where a simple beginning and ending section will work. I once did a test just to see for myself just to see the differences. Each page had only 8 graphic files, that were rendered before using, and approx 400 words listing in two tables. Not a huge page, but a page that was relatively nice to look at. One page I created by hand, just writting the code one line at a time. The other page, containing the same layout and content as the original, I developed using a 'drag and drop' website programming application. The page that I developed by hand loaded fast and smooth, the file size, including all 8 graphic files was a mere 54.2Kb The page that I developed using the 'drag and drop' editor, the file size for that one topped out at jsut over 322Kb So, we are talking 6 times larger in file size. Please keep in mind that I performed that test in 1995, right after the release of one of the more popular Microsoft Web Design products.

So, there are big differences in the way that some of the 'drag and drop' editors write the code, and what actually need to be on the code.

Question of the Month, August 2002