Designed for Web content providers or developers, Macromedia’s Contribute lets anyone within an organisation update, add and publish content to a Web site without knowing HTML. Therefore, certain individuals and departments within an organisation could be given permission to make changes to parts of a site quickly and easily using familiar drag and drop techniques – once the administrator has issued their permissions. Changes made to a site using Contribute doesn’t affect the Web site’s code in any way.

Contribute is a client-side tool that allows authorised persons to bypass the site’s developers and update content on an HTML Web site without knowing a single thing about HTML or FTP. Web developers ultimately maintain control of the site, but non-technical users are now able to make changes without affecting the style, layout and code of the site. Unfortunately, dynamic sites that are database-driven or Flash-based sites won’t gain much from Contribute because it’s really just a visual editor. Scripting is also not supported and there are compatibility issues with Unix servers, too. Plus, each version of Contribute requires an individual licence, which could prove costly if you intent to have lots of people using the software.

Setting up the software to access a Web site’s FTP server is a breeze, thanks to Contribute’s Connection Wizard. You will, however, need to input your Web site’s FTP server address, administrator user ID and password details. Once you’ve connected to your site’s FTP server, you can then browse to pages on your site using Contribute’s built-in browser.

Once you’ve loaded a page you wish to edit, you simply click Contribute’s Edit button. Contribute will then switch from browse mode to edit mode, offering a toolbar with common text and table editing features. You can then enter new text, insert images and tables, create links to other Web pages/sites and create new pages. Less technical users will appreciate Contribute’s drag and drop support for Microsoft office documents. Amended pages can be uploaded immediately, at a later date when you’re next online, or when they’ve been approved by a manager.

As several users may update a site simultaneously, Contribute automatically checks whether the pages a user is trying to edit are already being edited by others in order to prevent page version conflicts. The page rollback feature allows you to recover from errors by reverting to a stable version of a page. It also allows the network manager to manage a log of revised pages.

While the package works with most Web development applications, Contribute works best with Macromedia’s flagship Web development software, Dreamweaver MX. Some of the benefits of working with Dreamweaver include the automatic recognition of templates for better control over page updates, as well as the two packages sharing a check-in/check-out system that protects against accidental overwrites, so Dreamweaver developers and Contribute users can work together on the same Web site.

Current Dreamweaver MX users will also receive a free update, which provides additional Contribute-specific benefits such as a shared Contribute versioning system so you can use the same versioning and page roll back system as Contribute, integrated administration of Contribute sites so all of the site administration features available in Contribute can be used within Dreamweaver, and the ability to send Contribute connection keys - encrypted connection keys that give permission rights to contributors.

You don’t need to know HTML to use Contribute, but a little awareness will help you better understand Contribute’s functionality. The software’s use on dynamic pages (Cold Fusion, ASP, Flash and so on) is also limited, whereby you can only edit the static portions of the page using Contribute. For example, Contribute would allow us to make few changes to BIOS because our site is database-driven using PHP - a scripting language that is embedded into HTML - or indeed to our parent company’s site, Black Letter Publishing, which is created entirely in Flash. Also, as a client-side tool, Contribute can only be used on the licenced machine it’s installed on. This means you can’t use it to update Web pages from an Internet café, say.

Contribute is an intuitive program which hides a Web site’s code, and its word-processor-like tool for altering text and tables will appeal to general Windows users who have no understanding of HTML code. The software isn’t suitable however, for creating Web sites from scratch and less experienced users intending to set up a site should invest in a relatively easy-to-use application such as Microsoft’s FrontPage.

Where Contribute would prove ideal is for businesses and individuals who have paid a Web design company to design a non-dynamic HTML site and continue to pay the design company for making relatively small changes to the site. Contribute could save you a lot of time and money in the long run because in a matter of minutes you could update prices, text and images on your Web site without knowing the first thing about Web site design or coding. Its support for Dreamweaver templates also means that the software can grow with you if you decide to take a more hands-on approach to Web design.

Links:
Contribute Web site
Contribute Trial

BIOS, Aug 14, 03 | Print | Send | Comments (0) | Posted In Internet