Is there a good free product installs on a webpage to allow updates through the browser without knowledge of HTML?

March 10, 2004 10:04 AM

Is there a good, free product out there that I can install on a friend's webpage so he can update HTML files through his browser and not have to know any HTML? (details inside)

It can't be blogger or movable type or something with a lot of extra features like that. Basically I designed a site for him which uses a lot of includes in order to separate various content portions on a single page, the idea being that he could then update the text files individually from notepad and upload them when he felt like it, without having to get into the structure of the page.

The problem is that it turns out that this is too complicated for him. He needs to be able to do standard stuff like drop in images, bold text, links, all really basic stuff. So basically this would be a simple editor like the one in Movable Type, but it would just update a couple of text files, which would be be updated through the browser.

posted by chaz to computers & internet (10 comments total)

How about Dean Allen's Textpattern?
posted by The Michael The at 10:33 AM on March 10, 2004

Have you taken a look at Textpattern? It employs Textile for formatting, so one need not know a dime of HTML.

It may require someone else to set up the basic structure, or 'forms, pages, and sections', but from there it is all a matter of entering text, adding images, and publishing. Even the addition of imagery can be achieved with Textile.

Disclaimer: I use Textpattern on two websites and am absolutely amazed by it.

On preview: what The Michael The said.
posted by tenseone at 10:33 AM on March 10, 2004

Have a look at our fearless leader's haughey.com for a single-author wiki that does what you're describing. Click "View Source" in the footer of any page to see the syntax your friend would use.
posted by Aaorn at 10:35 AM on March 10, 2004

I also like texpattern, but I forgot to add in my details part is that the webhost does not have mysql. So what I'm really looking for is just a texteditor that can overwrite text files through a browser.
posted by chaz at 10:37 AM on March 10, 2004

There's a Blosxom plugin called wikieditish which allows editing of anything on a Blosxom blog through a browser-based form. You'd have to covert the site to Blosxom and figure out how to do formatting and image placement, though there may be plugins (e.g., textile) for those tasks, too.

The nice thing about Blosxom is that you don't need a database – it's built around simple text files which you presumably already have.
posted by timeistight at 10:43 AM on March 10, 2004

On the commercial front, I heartily recommend WebEditPro. From the user's standpoint it's just like using Microsoft Word, but generating decent HTML pages with the flexibility of CSS etc etc.

It's not free, but it's not crushingly expensive either - and the support is top-notch, even to the point of them doing bits of custom coding for free in order to get it working as you'd like it.
posted by skylar at 11:05 AM on March 10, 2004

Macromedia's Contribute is not at all free in the $100 range, but it has a rep as an great tool to work with.
posted by weston at 11:15 AM on March 10, 2004

I just read about Pages recently. Very simple: intended for static sites, no SQL nothing. Free. Web-based interface.
posted by adamrice at 12:07 PM on March 10, 2004

FIlethingie :-) lets you do this simply. If they are just editing your included files it may be the best.
posted by stuartmm at 1:39 PM on March 10, 2004

Wouldn't a rich text editor do the trick? This is a freebie that you integrate into his page, and it looks not unlike most word processors
posted by Pericles at 9:12 AM on March 11, 2004