Standards-Compliant Authoring Tools

Creating cross-browser code upfront will save you lots of time quality testing your web content. The following authoring tools adhere to the W3 standards. If you're using older versions of tools that rely on old browser bugs or generate browser-specific code, it may be time to upgrade:

• NVu is a standalone editor created from the remains of Mozilla Composer. Currently the work done on NVu is being ported back to mozilla source code.
• HTML-Kit is a full-featured, low priced editor designed to help HTML, XHTML and XML authors to edit, format, lookup help, validate, preview and publish web pages. Validation is done with HTML Tidy, so you can verify standards compliance.
• Macromedia™ Dreamweaver™ CS6
• Style Master and Layout Master by Western Civilisation

Some caveats: It appears that tools currently available from Namo generate IE-specific or Netscape 4-specific code that may require extra debugging for compatibility with standards-based browsers. Newer versions of Microsoft FrontPage™ have improved, however be sure not to rely on FrontPage-specific extensions for critical website content or functionality. Some versions of Microsoft Word create invalid HTML code that only works with Internet Explorer. Always be sure to validate your web pages.

Related links

• Validators
• HTML Central