HACKER Q&A
📣 dv35z

Local Mac Wysiwyg HTML Editor? (for “Lo-fi” website)


Hola!

After futzing with static site generators, and markdown/Obsidian publishing pipelines. I’m trying to get into writing - and making it part of a daily flow. I’ve really wanted to like using Obsidian, but I’m not a huge fan of the desktop app, and the mobile app takes too long to open - I’d like to try something else.

I want to take a swing at a simple folder of HTML files, which I rsync/SFTP to AWS S3. I’m posting how-to articles, blogs etc.

I’m looking for somewhat of a “lo-fi” solution. Local app, Not-cloud based, open-source preferred. I thought there was a VS Code plugin, but haven’t found it. I’d like to editing experience to be similar to editing Google Doc - as opposed in writing markdown/html tags. I frequently copy my notes into email, or exporting as PDF. An HTML doc is pretty good for that.

I was hoping to find an OSS version of Dreamweaver or something like that a but haven’t found it.

What do you suggest? I’d love to maintain the Obsidian-like cross linking ability… for now, I’m thinking to just put the HTML cross links in manually (unless you have better ideas)

Thanks!

  👤 marc_io Accepted Answer ✓
Logseq, which is a note-taking app much like Obsidian, can also generate a static site from its notes natively. It has a mobile app, which is very helpful when you are on the move. It is quite idiosyncratic, but it works well if you know your way around it. https://discuss.logseq.com/t/how-to-publish-your-logseq-as-a....

Another option is Pinegrow, an NW.js desktop-based website development app that uses plain HTML, CSS, and JS, just like Dreamweaver. Its UI is quite complicated, but you can hide what's not necessary for you. It also includes a bare-bones CMS, but it's not mandatory to use. It's not open-source, though.

👤 nicbou
I run a content website for a living and I do everything in Markdown inside Sublime Text. It works really well, especially if you already use Sublime a lot.

I made a few color scheme changes to increase line height, limit line width, and improve header contrast. The MarkdownEditing plugin is also nice if you use special features like footnotes.

👤 CharlesW
Have you tried TextEdit? It supports both rich text editing and code editing.

https://support.apple.com/guide/textedit/work-with-html-docu...

👤 phatskat
I don’t have any suggestions, just wanted to pop in and share my dismay that there doesn’t seem to be anything quite like what you’re looking for.

I started in plain HTML/refresh IE back in the day, and Dreamweaver (for all its many _many_ flaws) did a great job.

I really wonder how many young web engineers aren’t having their calling realized because of this simple gap - being able to write in a WYSIWYG editor and view the source, alter it, learn what the HTML and CSS were doing, and instantly see the results, was inspiring for me. I wonder how different it would’ve been to have the editor just push the work out to WordPress or whatever and never really get to see the inner workings.

👤 Vincenttermini
Check out https://github.com/GetPublii/Publii
👤 computerliker
SeaMonkey has an HTML composer https://www.seamonkey-project.org/doc/features
👤 subsection1h
Wow, no one has mentioned Org mode (https://orgmode.org). I started using Emacs nearly 20 years ago specifically because of Org. I use Org for all my static sites, note taking, to-do lists and calendar. Org has a lightweight markup language that has far more features than Markdown (e.g., plain text spreadsheets!), but the markup isn't visible to the extent that Markdown is in most editors. Emacs with Org files behaves almost like a WYSIWYG editor. For example, links in Org files are clickable and their URLs aren't visible unless a cursor is hovered over them. I'm an obsessive note-taker with more than 6,000 Org files in my personal knowledge base and none of the dozens of other writing apps that I've evaluated comes close to Emacs with Org (given my requirements). But to be fair, I create content on Linux only so support for mobile devices doesn't matter to me.

By the way, it's funny that you mentioned Dreamweaver, dv35z, because I experimented with using Dreamweaver as a writing app in the 90s. I still have hundreds of HTML files that include notes and essays I wrote back then using Dreamweaver. Needless to say, I definitely prefer Emacs with Org!

👤 SiVal
I'd like the same but with one more deployment option: create a (simple) static site that doesn't require any web server. I started an old relative on Dreamweaver about 25 years ago thinking that simple HTML files would make a good, open, archival rich-text alternative to plaintext. He wrote many articles that can still be double-clicked and viewed on any platform today and are among the most likely doc formats to still be readable a century from now (if any still are).

I had hoped that simple HTML would become a better choice than PDF or MS-Word for ordinary people writing for posterity, but unlike old Dreamweaver, almost all HTML tools today produce docs that must be served by a web server (and consist of separate HTML, CSS, JS, img files that get scattered.)

👤 lylejantzi3rd
I found myself in the same situation a little while ago. The closest thing I found was MarsEdit: https://redsweater.com/marsedit/.
👤 JeremyJaydan
It seems 'Notebooks' fits your requirements: https://www.notebooksapp.com/

I'm currently on the hunt for a notes app and found that. It seems to be a notes app / static site generator wysiwyg that uses HTML.

👤 imagetic
https://coteditor.com

https://github.com/coteditor

👤 firecall
Rapid Weaver maybe?

https://www.realmacsoftware.com/rapidweaver/

👤 lproven
All are a bit old and in need of some TLC, but the Mozilla editor had a number of forks and continuations:

* Kompozer

* nVu

* BlueGriffon

(In that order, IIRC.)

👤 1317
libreoffice can export to HTML, maybe not what you're looking for though
👤 unmole
What exactly does lo-fi mean in this context?
👤 vcg3rd
Typora