I am looking for a solution. I don’t want to use WordPress but I can’t get RapidWeaver to do what I need done. Maybe one of you can help?
If I put aside the fact that Wordpress is free except for hosting and admit for the sake of ease-of-use Rapidweaver is worth the cost of entry, well from there it all starts to go down hill for me. A lot of extra cost is incurred with 3rd party services to do features that are included with WordPress and my hosting company. Both applications work well at building simple html pages. It is how the html pages interact with the website visitors and the world of social media that it falls apart.
The following is what I need it to do.
Does not need to be a blog as the only difference between html pages and a blog is the ability to use tags and multiple categories which is NOT good for SEO.
Automatically build a RSS file and automatically ping an aggregator like Pingomatic. (currently must do this by hand)
Every page needs to have its own unique meta data. This what I must have to play. (currently must do this by hand)
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Webpage Title
Need the ability to have the visitor subscribe to an email list that automatically, once a week sends a summary email of all new articles, taken from the RSS feed is fine by me. (currently must use clumsy, expensive 3rd party service)
Prefer it was editable online but not 100% necessary. I can live with page creation from a mac based app as this is built be me not my clients, yet. (don’t know how long that will last. )
Text to html and script ratio is important. The smaller the code base and the faster the load time the better.
Page load speed is ultra important. Again the smaller the code base and the faster the load time the better.
So is there a way to do all these basics in RapidWeaver? I have been able to do all these in WordPress for years and years but WordPress is becoming more and more bloat even as they make the user interface simpler and cleaner.
EDIT: I might add, this should all be done automatically with just publishing the article.
Yes, Flash, with Add-ons (RW has a huge third party community) you can do all of these… though 4 is more a function of a server-side tool/application/web service than a website publisher.
RW can have a blog - there are many ways of doing that - if you find you ever need to.
Remember that the many Themes that both come with RW and can be bought as third-party enhancements control your pages’ look and feel, the CSS-based skin, if you like - as is the case with WP.
RW has sophisticated and flexible control over how you define and implement metatags.
The code in RW is already optimized - and you do have the ability to fine tune it further.
Since the code generated by RW is usually optimized, you’ll get good page load speeds.
For your 4, it’s not a web page as such which builds, maintains and manages a mailing list. It’s often a database-driven application, perhaps using PHP/MySQL residing on the server. You’d possibly end up using something like this for that.
I’d start with that Community page and sift around in there to see just what’s available.
For example, although not part of RW itself, many people use a major third party plugin called Stacks. It has stacks (components available to drop into the Stacks framework) to do most things that most users want.
You’ll also find this forum helpful in answering queries you have; good luck!
It is probably a good idea to shift your thinking away from WP. RW’s is a very different model.
RW is a web publishing tool with almost a thousand Add-ons (strongly suggest you spend some time looking through the Community site to see just what a huge range of things they can do!).
My focus is on my business and making the most sense. Including financial. RW is only a tool not a cult. The RSS Google search is the same thing as rss search on the community page. Same result. No creators just modifiers.
BTW: Thank you for taking the time to answer. It is just frustrating because they are the same answers I have already researched. The forum is filled with similar or same request. I just assumed they had been fulfilled and I couldn’t find the answers.
Well, I think you’ll find that almost all who post and/respond with advice or suggestions are doing so because they find that RW meets their needs. Many have been involved with web-design for a long time and have probably used (are still using) other applications or strict coding.
I am one who has decided to “drink” the RW “Kool-Aid”. I hope you find what you are looking for either through RW or another means.
FYI there is a cost to wordpress and it depends on how much your value your time. Wordpress needs a lot of handholding to keep the hackers out. That said some companies like wehostmacs have tools for this it still a possibility that you are going to be several hours a year cleaning up viagra adds etc. It happens all the time. Those who have bought into the Wordpress Koolaid know this. if not they are the lucky person on the planet or Google can’t find their sites. Nothing is free. Wordpress will have you learning all kinds of computer skills with its moving target of poor security.
thats why I use rapid weaver most of the time those of my clients that use wordpress I just warn them up front there will be issues and I charge to resolve them. I do not guarantee wordpress sites ever no matter what anyone tells me or what security measures I have put in place I have yet to find a pluggin or draconian over the top security solution so secure wordpress.
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