Freeway

What: Graphical Web development tool

By: Softpress Systems Ltd.

Cost: Express version: $89 download, $99 box; Pro version: $229 download, $249 box

Download: www.softpress.com

Freeway lets users with little to no HTML coding experience create compelling Web sites. The entry-level version, Freeway Express, includes 29 predesigned templates and lets you drag and drop graphics and text onto the page. Freeway automatically compresses the graphics for the Web and generates the HTML code. When you need to upload edited pages to your server, a "smart upload" feature speeds the process by uploading only changes, rather than the entire pages.

The Pro version of Freeway adds support for Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and layers and some advanced graphic handling capabilities, as well as the ability to automate some aspects of the design function.

The figure shows a Web site under construction in Freeway Express using one of the supplied templates.

Why I like it: Freeway makes it easier for non-Web developers to get their Web sites up and running. It is not as easy to use as Microsoft FrontPage, however.