I am somewhat new to css (not to html)and really don’t want to code if I don’t need to (I can if I must). That said I have purchased Rapidweaver (along with various plugins) and would like to hear from someone that has RW and uses FW to compare/contrast the two.
My main thrust is to produce clean sites with a minimal of custom coding. Site features I am currently looking for are: media presentation (photos first, followed by either slideshows or movies), online (shared) calendars, online shared news (blog or otherwise). I want to design sites, train clients to edit them either with the chosen app (like FW) or css/cms coding and/or sites (like http://www.editsite.net/)
Look forward to hearing from those that have both RW and FW.
I use both having started first with Freeway and feel that both have pros & cons but I am liking Rapidweaver more all the time. For quick clean sites with minimal coding I think Rapidweaver is probably unbeatable as long as you are happy to work with a template and take it from there.
One great thing about Rapidweaver is the ease of setting up things like RSS feeds which merely require a ticked box and setting up forms can be done in 30 seconds whereas they require a fair amount messing around in Freeway. Blogging is also dead easy in Rapidweaver but I don’t think there is any quick way to create and update blogs inside Freeway.
Having said all of that above unless you become pretty slick with CSS coding I’d say that Freeway offers advantages for completely original designs if that is the way you want to go, though I have heard that blocks in Rapidweaver can be really useful. That’s just my take though and others may feel differently. To my mind Rapidweaver is easier and somehow more attuned to changes in the market despite the lower price but experienced designers may prefer the more manual approach of Freeway.
Something I forgot to add earlier. Both Rapidweaver and Freeway have a fairly good website like this one by my experience of customer support at Rapidweaver has been extremely poor. I’ve written to them twice about bugs and once about a billing question and never received any kind of reply. Freeway is head and shoulders better in that regard.