Real Mac
Software have recently updated their application
RapidWeaver from 3.6 to version 4.0 this benefits
Leopard 10.5 users and it is also a free upgrade if
you are a registered user.
There is no doubt about it that creating websites with RapidWeaver is an easy to thing to do, you can pick from the many thems on offer and there are plenty of thems from other contributors to. However in my opinion RapidWeaver becomes really useful when you decide to purchase some choice plugins from certain developers other than just what is included by Real Mac Software. (I will highlight the real essential plugins to go for in just a moment). RapidWeaver itself contain different types of pages you can create simply decide the sort of page you want to create and then select a theme template. Here is a list of the types of pages you can create within RapidWeaver 4.0:
Blog, Contact Form, File Sharing, HTML Code, iFrame, Movie Album, Offsite Page, Photo Album, Quicktime, Styled Text.
Blog - Publish your blog using RapidWeaver’s fully-featured blog page type.
Contact Form - Receive visitor feedback and enquiries.
File Sharing - Share files, photos and documents with friends, family and co-workers.
HTML - If you’re happy to code individual pages in your site, you can do it with the HTML page type.
iFrame - Display any external website within your own RapidWeaver-styled page.
Movie Album - Allows you to share a gallery of QuickTime movies with visitors.
Offsite Page - The Offsite page allows you insert external links into the navigation bar, for example a link to a forum.
Photo Album - Easily build a CSS-based Gallery or a Flash Slide-show with your iPhoto albums or other images. QuickTime Add a single QuickTime movie to your site.
Styled Text - Create your page content in a what-you-see-is-what-you-get format. You have the ability to set font styles, change colours, drop-in images, movies and other files.
However in my opinion most people want to be able to have a more freer control over what they would like to do with a page, so there are three plugins you simply must have to make RapidWeaver a more satisfactory option:
YourHead Software - Blocks
This is the no.1 plugin because it goes beyond the styled text page template in RapidWeaver it features tools within this page template that enables you to add “text” “Image Text” “Html Code” also you can embed pages from other templates in RapidWeaver so for instance if you selected a movie page, you could embed that page in to your blocks page, and insert as many types of pages as you like.
Another feature is that you can drag and drop images into this template with the option of resizing them to the desired size, Rapidweaver has a provision within its application to “Normalise” its images which is very useful in keeping the file size of the website down.
Blocks as plugin is a must have for any RapidWeaver user, we have already mentioned some very good reasons for that, however Blocks is capable of much more thanks to this next layout
JonasTHEMES - BlocksBox
BlocksBox works in conjuction with Blocks from YourHead Software. The beauty of this Rapidweaver theme is that it contains no elements for you to put your content in, another words you are free to create your own website design and include your content in with your own design.
All you have to do is select your page template, namely “Blocks” then you select the theme “BlocksBox” if you select preview you will not see a solitary thing, this means now that if you use blocks you can drag in buttons, horizontal and vertical lines, images, insert your text, logos and much more. Select the preview button and you will see what your design is currently displaying as, which means all you have to do is move around freely around the workspace in “Blocks” to make your adjustments to improve your site design.
Again a must have if you purchase a copy of RapidWeaver.
YourHead Software - PayLoom
You may be wondering what Payloom is ? Well its simply a PayPal integration template for your website, it enables you to quickly build a PayPal online store very quickly, it features a very easy to use form in edit mode for you to import images of your products and select a title, description, a price, shipping charges and details and the ability to customise the look of the store.
I have created an example of a store for a watercolour artist please click this link to take a look.
I feel this is another essential element to add to your Rapidweaver software.
Here are 9 of the most standout contributors (Click their names to go to their webpages)
1/ Your Head Software - Produce many more essential plugins!
2/ MultiThemes - Some Add-ons and eye-catching Themes
3/ Jonas Themes - Creativity With No Boundaries!
4/ RW ThemeMiner - Create your Own RapidWeaver Theme!
5/ Rapid Refills - Beautiful Eye Catching Themes
6/ RapidWeaver.Org - Extending The Power Of "Blocks" From YourHead Software
"Excellent addition to RapidWeaver, that allows you to extend the boundaries of the Block
Plugin, by creating your own theme with some flashy results......."
7/ Jumsoft - Classy Themes From A Prolific Company.....
"This is one company to regularly check out, the quality is top notch and they produce resources for
a lot of Mac applications, A Software Editorial favourite!!!"
8/ RapidWeaverThemes.com - Inspirational Themes To The Dedicated RapidWeaver User
"A very interesting website packed full of quality content the themes are well produced, and they
also provide custom themes for those that want something unique"
9/ BlueBall Design - Sensational Web Themes For Those Of Us That Need A Little Inspiration
"Specialists in graphic design, who have truly excelled themselves in these feature packed
RapidWeaver templates"
10/ ToThePointSoftware - This Is Simply A Must Have To Customise Any RapidWeaver Theme
"Easy to use, and very addictive you simply must get yourself a copy ..."
Keep An eye on this list as I intend to add to it.
Whats New
Concentrating on the new features of RapidWeaver 4.0, first it is only for Leopard 10.5 users, so if you are still using Tiger operating system you need to choose the 3.6 version. When you first open up RapidWeaver 4.0 you notice that there has been Graphic User Interface visual change which I think looks a nice improvement, the actual design of the workspace has not changed I am pleased to say, however I feel in one respect it has been overdone in one small area, and that is when publishing your edited pages it launches a cover-flow style box that moves from one side to the other to indicate progress of the upload session, I feel this is an unnecessary change, I actually preferred the original display for this function, but that is of course a personal opinion. Bigger improvements in site and page publishing with a simple one-click Web publishing button is provided, “WebClip” icon support for iPhone and iPod touch bookmarking, and built-in support for Google Analytics. RapidWeaver also adds new theme management features: high-res previews, integrated search, folder support and filtering. Also Four new themes have been added too.
Overall Performance
Being a 3.6 user before automatically had you thinking how would this new version perform? For instance if you open your rw3 file it will automatically open up in version 4, however once you do this be prepared for the fact that any changes you make to the file will be saved as an rw4 file, and the only way you can change a rw3 file is to open it up in the 3.6 version. I found that although I kept my rw3 file from the previous version I would bite the bullet and get straight into the new version, and I must admit that I was 75% satisfied with the results, I have to admit that for the time I have been using it I have encountered problems, for instance when opening up my file, it sometimes hangs and I have to perform a “Force Quit” and then other times it would load normally, I have had moments also when I have published pages and they have not performed the changes on the server, as has been displayed in the preview of the application, this has been unusual experience, but thankfully has not happened often. For most of the time I have been very satisfied with the results and hope that maybe update patches will be released to make these problems a thing of the past.
Conclusion
After all I have said about RapidWeaver 4.0 I still love using Real Mac Software’s flagship product, for my circumstances I need extra latitude for creativity and that is why I am glad to have the tools from Yourhead Software and Jonas Themes and other contributors, without them the software would lack in a few area’s of usability for my needs. However if you want a website for general purposes such as storing your photographs and videos as well blogging but don’t want to give too much thought to the design of your webpages then this will be a perfect package for you.
The application is easy to use, in fact anyone can use it, the themes are very eye catching and customisations can be made with extreme ease. But I would recommend playing with sample projects first, just so you can get the hang of it, once you have, you will learn it is enjoyable experience to make websites.
RapidWeaver excels over iWeb and many other similar web creation products and whilst it is not perfect, I would always recommend it because it gets better and better, mainly because “Real Mac Software” has a dedicated team to help it’s users along the way as well as constantly looking to improve its functionality and repairing any bugs in the program. I would personally like to thank Daniel Counsell and Nik Fletcher for their support in providing the application for me to review.
Features : 4.5 out of 5.0
Performance : 4.0 Out Of 5.0
Value For Money : 4.5 Out Of 5.0
Overall Rating : 4.3 Out Of 5.0
There is no doubt about it that creating websites with RapidWeaver is an easy to thing to do, you can pick from the many thems on offer and there are plenty of thems from other contributors to. However in my opinion RapidWeaver becomes really useful when you decide to purchase some choice plugins from certain developers other than just what is included by Real Mac Software. (I will highlight the real essential plugins to go for in just a moment). RapidWeaver itself contain different types of pages you can create simply decide the sort of page you want to create and then select a theme template. Here is a list of the types of pages you can create within RapidWeaver 4.0:
Blog, Contact Form, File Sharing, HTML Code, iFrame, Movie Album, Offsite Page, Photo Album, Quicktime, Styled Text.
Blog - Publish your blog using RapidWeaver’s fully-featured blog page type.
Contact Form - Receive visitor feedback and enquiries.
File Sharing - Share files, photos and documents with friends, family and co-workers.
HTML - If you’re happy to code individual pages in your site, you can do it with the HTML page type.
iFrame - Display any external website within your own RapidWeaver-styled page.
Movie Album - Allows you to share a gallery of QuickTime movies with visitors.
Offsite Page - The Offsite page allows you insert external links into the navigation bar, for example a link to a forum.
Photo Album - Easily build a CSS-based Gallery or a Flash Slide-show with your iPhoto albums or other images. QuickTime Add a single QuickTime movie to your site.
Styled Text - Create your page content in a what-you-see-is-what-you-get format. You have the ability to set font styles, change colours, drop-in images, movies and other files.
However in my opinion most people want to be able to have a more freer control over what they would like to do with a page, so there are three plugins you simply must have to make RapidWeaver a more satisfactory option:
YourHead Software - Blocks
This is the no.1 plugin because it goes beyond the styled text page template in RapidWeaver it features tools within this page template that enables you to add “text” “Image Text” “Html Code” also you can embed pages from other templates in RapidWeaver so for instance if you selected a movie page, you could embed that page in to your blocks page, and insert as many types of pages as you like.
Another feature is that you can drag and drop images into this template with the option of resizing them to the desired size, Rapidweaver has a provision within its application to “Normalise” its images which is very useful in keeping the file size of the website down.
Blocks as plugin is a must have for any RapidWeaver user, we have already mentioned some very good reasons for that, however Blocks is capable of much more thanks to this next layout
JonasTHEMES - BlocksBox
BlocksBox works in conjuction with Blocks from YourHead Software. The beauty of this Rapidweaver theme is that it contains no elements for you to put your content in, another words you are free to create your own website design and include your content in with your own design.
All you have to do is select your page template, namely “Blocks” then you select the theme “BlocksBox” if you select preview you will not see a solitary thing, this means now that if you use blocks you can drag in buttons, horizontal and vertical lines, images, insert your text, logos and much more. Select the preview button and you will see what your design is currently displaying as, which means all you have to do is move around freely around the workspace in “Blocks” to make your adjustments to improve your site design.
Again a must have if you purchase a copy of RapidWeaver.
YourHead Software - PayLoom
You may be wondering what Payloom is ? Well its simply a PayPal integration template for your website, it enables you to quickly build a PayPal online store very quickly, it features a very easy to use form in edit mode for you to import images of your products and select a title, description, a price, shipping charges and details and the ability to customise the look of the store.
I have created an example of a store for a watercolour artist please click this link to take a look.
I feel this is another essential element to add to your Rapidweaver software.
Here are 9 of the most standout contributors (Click their names to go to their webpages)
1/ Your Head Software - Produce many more essential plugins!
2/ MultiThemes - Some Add-ons and eye-catching Themes
3/ Jonas Themes - Creativity With No Boundaries!
4/ RW ThemeMiner - Create your Own RapidWeaver Theme!
5/ Rapid Refills - Beautiful Eye Catching Themes
6/ RapidWeaver.Org - Extending The Power Of "Blocks" From YourHead Software
"Excellent addition to RapidWeaver, that allows you to extend the boundaries of the Block
Plugin, by creating your own theme with some flashy results......."
7/ Jumsoft - Classy Themes From A Prolific Company.....
"This is one company to regularly check out, the quality is top notch and they produce resources for
a lot of Mac applications, A Software Editorial favourite!!!"
8/ RapidWeaverThemes.com - Inspirational Themes To The Dedicated RapidWeaver User
"A very interesting website packed full of quality content the themes are well produced, and they
also provide custom themes for those that want something unique"
9/ BlueBall Design - Sensational Web Themes For Those Of Us That Need A Little Inspiration
"Specialists in graphic design, who have truly excelled themselves in these feature packed
RapidWeaver templates"
10/ ToThePointSoftware - This Is Simply A Must Have To Customise Any RapidWeaver Theme
"Easy to use, and very addictive you simply must get yourself a copy ..."
Keep An eye on this list as I intend to add to it.
Whats New
Concentrating on the new features of RapidWeaver 4.0, first it is only for Leopard 10.5 users, so if you are still using Tiger operating system you need to choose the 3.6 version. When you first open up RapidWeaver 4.0 you notice that there has been Graphic User Interface visual change which I think looks a nice improvement, the actual design of the workspace has not changed I am pleased to say, however I feel in one respect it has been overdone in one small area, and that is when publishing your edited pages it launches a cover-flow style box that moves from one side to the other to indicate progress of the upload session, I feel this is an unnecessary change, I actually preferred the original display for this function, but that is of course a personal opinion. Bigger improvements in site and page publishing with a simple one-click Web publishing button is provided, “WebClip” icon support for iPhone and iPod touch bookmarking, and built-in support for Google Analytics. RapidWeaver also adds new theme management features: high-res previews, integrated search, folder support and filtering. Also Four new themes have been added too.
Overall Performance
Being a 3.6 user before automatically had you thinking how would this new version perform? For instance if you open your rw3 file it will automatically open up in version 4, however once you do this be prepared for the fact that any changes you make to the file will be saved as an rw4 file, and the only way you can change a rw3 file is to open it up in the 3.6 version. I found that although I kept my rw3 file from the previous version I would bite the bullet and get straight into the new version, and I must admit that I was 75% satisfied with the results, I have to admit that for the time I have been using it I have encountered problems, for instance when opening up my file, it sometimes hangs and I have to perform a “Force Quit” and then other times it would load normally, I have had moments also when I have published pages and they have not performed the changes on the server, as has been displayed in the preview of the application, this has been unusual experience, but thankfully has not happened often. For most of the time I have been very satisfied with the results and hope that maybe update patches will be released to make these problems a thing of the past.
Conclusion
After all I have said about RapidWeaver 4.0 I still love using Real Mac Software’s flagship product, for my circumstances I need extra latitude for creativity and that is why I am glad to have the tools from Yourhead Software and Jonas Themes and other contributors, without them the software would lack in a few area’s of usability for my needs. However if you want a website for general purposes such as storing your photographs and videos as well blogging but don’t want to give too much thought to the design of your webpages then this will be a perfect package for you.
The application is easy to use, in fact anyone can use it, the themes are very eye catching and customisations can be made with extreme ease. But I would recommend playing with sample projects first, just so you can get the hang of it, once you have, you will learn it is enjoyable experience to make websites.
RapidWeaver excels over iWeb and many other similar web creation products and whilst it is not perfect, I would always recommend it because it gets better and better, mainly because “Real Mac Software” has a dedicated team to help it’s users along the way as well as constantly looking to improve its functionality and repairing any bugs in the program. I would personally like to thank Daniel Counsell and Nik Fletcher for their support in providing the application for me to review.
Features : 4.5 out of 5.0
Performance : 4.0 Out Of 5.0
Value For Money : 4.5 Out Of 5.0
Overall Rating : 4.3 Out Of 5.0
Real Mac Software RapidWeaver 4.0 Review