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Why HTMLButcher?
HTMLButcher was born out of a necessity.
We are a software house which does custom programming for dynamic sites. Sites are created by webdesigners, normally in Photoshop or Corel Draw, which generates an image. This image must be sliced to HTML before it can be handed to the programmers.
The common way to slice to HTML is using the Photoshop slice and Save for web functions. But everyone who sliced a complex site in Phothoshop knows the pain it is to slice corretly, and any programmer who received a complex site sliced by Photoshop knows the pain to integrate it with dynamic programming.
The problem starts with Photoshop only slicing sites with a single table. Programmers know that for integration, putting each data block into a separate table, is an enormous help to code it (if not the only feasible way).
Other than that, most webdesigners are not programmers, and some does not even know HTML (not all designers do only websites). How can a programmer explain exactly how the HTML must be sliced for a non-programmer?
Summing it up, the vast majority of images sliced by Photoshop, must be (heavily) edited after slicing. More tables must be added, cells must be joined, CSS styles must be created. Who had to do it at least one time, knows it IS a big pain.
One side effect of that, is that to slice a website, people charges a lot of money. They know the pain it is, people asking for the slicing also knows then pain. All website jobs became constrained by the slicing phase, becase of price and time to do it correctly.
Also everyone who has customers, know that they love to change the design mid-project. Depending on the depth of the change, the integration could need to be completly redone.
With all this, here in Brazil where we are located, pure slicing jobs where being charged between US$ 250.00 and US$ 600.00 per site. And we had no choice but paying, because we know the time it takes to slice correctly.
The HTMLButcher idea
We searched for tools to slice websites, and we found none good enough. No tool slice to more than one table. No tool allows for mask reusing between pages (and everyone knows that HTML pages normally have a base layout with only the body changing). Transparent images? Nah!
How many people does websites nowadays? How many sites are sliced per day? And yet no good tool to slice them? We needed to do something about it.
So we created HTMLButcher. With it, we programmers ourselves slice our own HTML. And it is easy, fast, fun, generates HTML completly suited for programming. Layout masks can be reused, infinitely deep tables can be nested, transparent GIF and PNG files can be easily generated, and project files can be saved and reused in case layout changes.
Then we showed it to our webdesigner partners. They loved it. It is easy, they don't need to know HTML, the tool is easy to use, and they can even send the project file directly to the programmers, not even needing to generate the HTML themselves. They can slice the base work, and let the programmers slice the dynamic part the way they prefer. Or use it for simple prototyping and showing it on their website for the customers.
Rangel Gustavo Reale
SIB IT - Brazil
rangelspam@gmail.com
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