Dear Final Debug: My boss has decided that he must have Java on our site. He doesn’t know what Java is-maybe he read about it in Forbes or something-or understand that much of the same functionality is possible with simpler code (I’m thinking of things like animated GIFs). He just wants it, will not be swayed and it’s my job to implement it. The problem is that I’m no Java programmer and I want to get this out of the way quickly. Any suggestions?-name withheld for fear of retribution, Chicago.
Final Debug Responds: Mr. or Ms. X, our first suggestion is that you get someone else to do it. Assuming you can’t get away with that, you might want to consider Jamba.
We evaluated Jamba in a Special Report on Java tools several months ago, and a new version mitigates many of our initial lukewarm impressions. The program is intended for nonprogrammers (designers, in particular) who want to add interactivity to Web pages without having to learn what terms like “public class” and “void init” mean. You can select and manipulate objects in a rather straightforward manner and the new version includes much improved animation tools and data publishing. This addition of Jamba also features “wizards” for automating many tasks and has also made code easier to manipulate. It’s easy to learn, develop and deploy basic Java applets that will please your boss. A demonstration version is available for free from Jamba’s Web site.
Postscript: Don’t gamble on Jamba for any major long-term tasks, because it’s unclear who’s developing and marketing the product. Aimtech, which built the initial version, was eaten up by Asymetrix in September, and on October 22 Asymetrix sold Jamba to Interleaf. Three owners in three months may not spell s-t-a-b-i-l-i-t-y.
What would you suggest to the reader with no name? We want to know.
More on last week
Our column on the battle between FrontPage and Fusion garnered many notes in favor of Fusion and none promoting FrontPage. Here’s a sample, from Al Kratzer:
As a graphic designer who designs web pages/sites, Fusion is and will remain the ONLY tool I use until the day comes when I’ll be able to place an image on a page and slide it around to my heart’s content in pursuit of perfect placement. The left/center/right-only choices in Frontpage make it a pain in the rear to experiment with layout. Fusion’s pages may be a bit code-heavy, but since the majority of download time is in the graphics, designers are better off tweaking their image overhead to get faster loading anyway! By using Fusion’s snap-to-grid option, the resulting code is quite a bit tighter. Give me Fusion and a good GIF/JPG reduction tool like Smartsaver anyday!
We have a new contest!
This time, the prize is a copy of O’Reilly and Associates’ Webmaster in a Nutshell: A Desktop Quick Reference. Here’s an appropriately Webmaster-centric question:
Microsoft’s new XML parser does something differently on Netscape browsers than it does on Microsoft browsers. What is that difference?
Do you know the answer? Let us know.
