While HTML has made it easier for many people to become Web publishers, it still is not a particularly intuitive tool. Inside the Internet Explorer Suite, Microsoft has included FrontPad, an HTML editor with a graphical user interface that is based on the full-featured FrontPage 97.

FrontPad includes all of the features of the FrontPage 97 editor except for some premium features such as the editing of frames, image maps, proofing tools, active server pages, preview in browser, and all WebBot components except for Include, Search, and Time-Stamp. In Beta 1, tables, forms, plug-ins, Java Applets, JScript and VBScript are disabled temporarily. Although the user interface for inserting and editing these features has been disabled, FrontPad can render and refresh this HTML as well as allow users to edit it through the View HTML command.

Key Features of FrontPad

• Personal Home Page wizard (Beta 2). This wizard takes you step-by-step through the process of creating a personal home page.
  
  
• Table creation and editing (Beta 2). Insert a table into a Web page and then edit either the entire table or individual cells.
  
  
• Forms. Add forms to your Web page that people can fill out and return. Your forms can include text boxes, checkboxes, drop-down menus, images, and more. (You must be connected to a server running FrontPage server extensions to use these forms-related features.)
  
  
• Page templates and wizards (Beta 2). If you’re connected to a server running FrontPage server extensions, you can also use forms-related wizards and templates that let you create:
  • A form by selecting the types of information you need to collect
  • A page to acknowledge that you’ve received a user’s input
  • A survey to collect information from readers and store it on your Web server
  
  
• Java, JScript, plug-in, and ActiveX support. FrontPad supports top Internet technologies to make your pages more engaging. Only ActiveX control support is enabled in this preview release; the others are available in Beta 2.

What are the Benefits of Authoring?

• Fast Web page development. With FrontPad, there’s no need to learn HTML; the application has a graphical user interface. FrontPad even lets novices insert Java applets, ActiveX controls, or scripts, without knowing any programming. However, for people who still like to edit HTML directly, there is the new color-coded HTML editing mode.
  
  
• Tight suite integration. With FrontPad installed, the Edit button on the Internet Explorer toolbar allows the currently viewed page to be easily edited. FrontPad has also been integrated into the Internet Explorer Web View wizard and includes specific commands supporting the customization of Web View folders.

How does Authoring Work?

On any Web page, a user can click the Edit button on the Internet Explorer toolbar to open FrontPad with all of the tables, controls, and pictures displayed inside the editor. FrontPad makes it easy to download pages from the Web locally by enabling users to save an entire Web page (pictures included) in a single step.

FrontPad also helps users customize their environment using the Web View feature discussed later in this document. When users or administrators customize a folder with HTML, the Customize This Folder wizard uses FrontPad. If they want that new Web page to include folder attributes, such as the actual folder contents, the folder’s name, or even links to other parts of the Internet Explorer suite such as Outlook Express, FrontPad makes it easy. See the True Web Integration section of this document for more details.

Most WebBot components are added to a page using the Bot option on the Inser menu in the FrontPage editor. When a WebBot component is inserted, dialog boxes help the user configure it, and then a graphical representation of the WebBot component is visible in the editor at that position in the page. A few of the WebBot components are specifically associated with forms and are accessed via the Form Properties dialog box rather than Insert Bot. When the user views a page that includes a WebBot component, the interactive or programming properties of it are available. The WebBot components themselves are stored in a page using a specially formatted HTML comment, although this representation is not normally seen by the FrontPage author.