mindflayer.net

Wordpress, Livejournal, Blogger, Blogspot, and Moveable Type cover darn near the full spectrum of tools for the more savvy blogger. I’ve run my blog on MT and Wordpress for years and they are the tools with which I am most comfortable. There is a level of control in being able to really get in and mess with code that appeals - even when the user is not a savvy coder.

However, it was time I tried iWeb and .Mac publishing. There are some using it as their full-fledged blogging and site construction solution and it is a matter of time before someone asks me if I have used it. Time to dive in and test the waters.

Right off the bat, there is no work on the backend, no databases to set up, no Apache conf files to edit, and no hammering away at the command line. However, that loss of initial complexity is instead replaced with the complexity of the tool itself. With Wordpress I can use ecto, MarsEdit, or the Web interface to quickly write an entry. It’s a self-contained action. With iWeb, I have to use the tool to specify to add an entry, change the template, and then publish. That seems to be a disruptive workflow, especially in today’s world of Twitter and Pownce and SMS-to-Web publishing.

Another failure of iWeb is the inability to drag and drop a link straight to galleries created with iPhoto ‘08 and published to .Mac. Users are instead given Web “widgets” that are dropped onto the created pages. They certainly don’t have the polish that the iPhoto-created galleries exhibit.

I’ll continue to work with iWeb as I also process in parallel with Wordpress. Several friends use iWeb and seem to enjoy it. With most things of this sort it is probably the change in workflow that is keeping me from really getting the flow of the product. Expect continued feedback in a few days.