summary of flow chart of Website repsonses

[Cathy Edstrom]

A couple of people asked me to summarize the answers I received to my
question about flow chart programs for website. Here are the responses.

>I can't speak for Wintel users, but on the Mac side, Adobe SiteMill does an
>adequate job, and early reviews on the new rev (3.0) of GoLive CyberStudio
>indicate that it does a good job at this. NetObjects Fusion does this very
>well, but has some other annoying features that make it (IMO) not such a
>good value. If you use a PC, Adobe seems to be moving strongly in the
>direction of standardizing their feature-sets and interfaces to be
>essentially the same across platforms, so SiteMill may work adequately.
>YMMV.

>The more sophisticated web packages have that capability. We use GoLive
>CyberStudio. It creates a flowchart as part of it site management
>strategy.. NetFusion also has flowcharting capabilities.

>GoLive Cyberstudio does just that.
>
>
>http://www.golive.com/
>
>(I am not shilling for this product, by the way.  I have not used it
>myself, but my assistant is revamping our org's website with it and it's
>really good.)
>

>     You may wish to look at the systems profiled in two of my Web 
>clearinghouses for some possibilities:
>
>      Project Aristotle(sm)
>      http://www.public.iastate.edu/~CYBERSTACKS/Aristotle.htm
>
>      Note: WebMap
>
>     The Big Picture(sm)
>     http://www.public.iastate.edu/~CYBERSTACKS/BigPic.htm
>     
>     Note: SiteServer

>There are a number of packages out there that do Web site specific
>blueprints, but at Argus we prefer to use a general charting package
>called Visio (www.visio.com).  It's an excellent tool, and because it's a
>general tool, we're not confined by someone else's idea of how a Web site
>should be diagrammed, although they do provide a library of images that
>can be used for this purpose.

>FrontPage '98 will. Another Microsoft solution:)

>webMaster Pro (shareware) and MS FrontPage 98 will do the trick for you.

>We're considering a product called MerzScope from MerzCom
><http://www.merzcom.com/>.
>I haven't looked at it extensively, but it seems interesting.  The blurb
>on their web page states:
>
>
>> MerzScopeTM is the revolutionary new way to map and surf online
documents, be they
>>   on the World Wide Web or on your company's intranet. Compatible with any
>>   Java-enabled browser, MerzScope is a mapping and navigating tool that
allows you to
>>   produce dynamic graphical maps of any collection of Web pages and links.
>> 
>>   MerzScope is the only tool that allows you to create beautiful,
stylish and effective maps
>>   that reflect your company's philosophy and will delight your site's
visitors.
>> 
>>   Unlike traditional Web maps, MerzScope maps are relational, not
hierarchical, showing
>>   surfers a complete graphical overview of a map's content. Surfers can
navigate with just a
>>   simple mouse click.
>
>Sales hype aside, potential problems are that it's a Java applet (we
>still have a lot of users with Netscape 3 for Windows 3.1), and it takes
>a while to load. 
>
>PC Mag seems to like it.  There's a review at
><http://www.zdnet.com/pcmag/features/java98/289795.html>
>

>If you're using FrontPage 98 on a Windows 95 or NT, and your pages are
>defined in the FrontPage Explorer, it shows you a flow chart of your
>site.  You can also see all the hyperlinks to and from pages and manage
>the links and folders.


Cathy Edstrom
NOAA Central Library
1315 East-West Highway
Silver Spring, MD 20910
301-713-2600 ext. 134
http://www.lib.noaa.gov/
cedstrom at nodc.noaa.gov