9/10/00

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September, 2000

9/10/00

A funny thing happened in composing this entry. Or, perhaps I should say that something quirky happened whilst composing this entry. Or rather, it happened shortly before I began composing this entry. I think.

Anyway, I had just installed Office 2000: Word, Excel, Powerpoint et al. Not long afterward I decided to update my journal (yeah, I know. A week. I got busy, okay?). Even though I now have Dreamweaver 3, I thought I'd do a quicky entry using FrontPage Editor. Guess what happened when I tried to preview my page in IE5? F**king image errors!!!! Yarrrrggghhh! I'd never gotten them before. I have all the freaking graphics in the folder with the .htm files -- there should be no path problems in the html. So. I calmed down and opened the .htm file in Netscape. Bingo. Images showed up quite nicely.

Can someone tell me what happened with IE5? I mean it. Now I can't preview correctly in IE5 -- I mean, when I do, I'll have these stoopid image errors. That never happened before. Ever. I swear. What's really ironic is that I truly prefer IE5 over Netscape as my primary browser -- it's more robust and less cranky than Netscape. It's just that NOW I have THIS stoopid problem. GRRRRRR!

So now I'm finally composing this in Dreamweaver (even though the meta tag still shows "Microsoft FrontPage 3.0" -- I'm kinda afraid to delete it, what if all hell breaks loose; who knows what booby traps MS has planted in that crappy, bloated FrontPage source code). Anyway, I have to get used to using Dreamweaver. So far I like it -- it's just that there's a bit more of a learning curve. This is one big, freaking program.

Now, if I could JUST figure out what happened with IE5...

I Finally began the first three of my classes last week. Photoshop on Wednesday, Dreamweaver on Thursday and Flash 4 on Friday. I have HTML on Monday and JavaScript on Tuesday.

I think I'm going to have the most fun with Flash -- as complicated as it is. I just know that once I have a firm handle on the program, I'm gonna be wasting a lot of time playing with it. Photoshop is going to be something of a bear -- of grizzly proportions. Dreamweaver is a piece of cake, despite the size and scope of the program. I've used so many different web editors that it's just a matter of learning my way around a particular interface. I can't wait for the HTML class -- I've been soooo wanting to "fill in the gaps" of what little I know of it. JavaScript might be a little frustrating -- I've tangled with some pretty nasty code in the past.

Still, it's really nice learning something fun for a change -- something I'm truly interested in. Plus, I got my student card and grabbed up a pile of nicely discounted "academic" software: MS Office 2000 (Standard Edition -- $145), Photoshop ($275), Flash and Illustrator (only a hundred bucks each!!!). I bought Dreamweaver (along with Paint Shop Pro) about a month ago -- but I'm glad that I didn't buy the academic version, it ships without HomeSite.

I'll also be taking some Mac courses in Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Fireworks and Quarkxpress. A little wishful thinking...just dreaming of that G4 (dual 450 MHz processors) in Graphite. Not that I'd ever get rid of Mr. Wizard.

So, I'm having fun and meeting some nice people.

I just received email confirmation that I am "officially" a WebRat. You may have noticed the graphic in the left column as you've (hopefully) read through my entries. If you're curious, please do visit the site -- there you shall find a list of journals by "writers with attitude." The site is maintained by Melanie Miller Fletcher -- once you read just one of her journal entries, I guarantee that you will end up clicking madly through her archives, promising yourself that you swear go to bed after the last entry... Ling the Merciless will have you giggling uncontrollably. Vera Nazarian gives great writing advice and Julia Blackshear Kosatka will keep you hooked as you follow the progress of her latest writing project, Waking the Sentinel. Bookmark the entire list of WebRats: Harold, Marti, Trey and all the others. I'm in very good company.