ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT FREEVIEW

Dearie me...

Found this in the source:

language="Javascript1.2"

No wonder it doesn't work on any of my browsers. Haven't you ever heard of HTML???

And as for using Frontpage... You shouldn't. Use 1st Page 2000 or Coffee Cup - they're more suitable for beginners and are W3C compliant unlike Frontpage

Surely if the government imposed a deadline / threat -

The Anologue Signal Will Be Switched Off at 01 Feb 2005 Like it or Lump It.

For example. - It would improve takeup as if people want TV they will have to buy digital, or do without. I think it would anyway.

And in a plus side Labour might fall out of power.

and another plus side; we'll get more channels when analogue switches off...and on the minus, they'll be shopping cha nnels

Oh really, and how do you propose that is going to happen?

At present, digital penetration is around 40%. It's taken 5 years to get to that figure. You really think that the remaining 60% will changeover in the next 2 years? But in any case (and the government knows this) that that figure is rididculously over-inflated. The average home these days may have 3 or 4 TV's in it, but only 1 of them needs to have a Sky box connected to it for it to count as a digital home. What about the other 3 TV's? They wouldn't be able to receive anything without analogue transmission. A true digital home is one which could manage without any analogue transmission - using that benchmark I'd be surprised if digital penetration was even in double figures.

And whilst DTT boxes might be affordable, for most people it is still not really viable to kit out every TV in the house with them. To say nothing of the millions of people who receive their terrestrial broadcasts through analogue only relays, or those people who live in an analogue cable area who are still waiting for digital.

Furthermore, some devices rely on analogue signals too - there has been no significant development of digital replacements for devices like pocket TV's, and to the best of my knowledge their are no consumer level VCR's with digital tuners in them yet either. Even if these devices appeared in Dixons tomorrow, it would be impossible for people to have replaced all their analogue devices with these digital replacements within 2 years.

The government might spout on all they like about ending analogue transmission soon (but even they admit that 2 years is an impossibility), but in reality, I can't see analogue transmission ending any time in the next 10 years. Remember that VHF transmission did not end until 21 years after the first UHF broadcasts - and that did not involve replacing anything like the amount of equipment that is required now.

Personally I would recommend Dreamweaver (I use it myself ) but it's a bit pricey though.

HTML editors are really not suitable for beginners - I never found them easy to work with and they're more suited to people who know their HTML well and are confident at it.

But whether you are a beginner or a pro, avoid Frontpage at all costs

Tried Dreamweaver and it's resulting HTML wouldn't validate at all

Also found it too cluttered even on a 1600x1200 display

I ended up using 1st Page 2000 from http://www.evrsoft.com and never looked back. It really is idiot-proof. It even has that ghastly Javascript thing which no-one should ever use but we can't all be perfect ;-P

A wee note on 1st Page - one of it's Javascript scripts flags up as a virus, but is OK. It's just a badly coded loop

(Yes, I can read Javascript even though I refuse to use it and have removed it from my browsers. It's a very nasty piece of work and those idiots who thought it up should be locked in a dungeon for life and beyond...)

It is nevertheless the basis of dynamic web pages. I agree that HTML is better used for all static elements, and many of those silly effects are very over-used. but JavaScript does have it's place and I see no problem with it when it's use is appropriate.

what is this javascript business all about then?

VBScript is much nicer than JavaScript.

Data type casting? Pah. Nothing like a good old 'Variant' data type.

Java is basically a botched version of C, because some bods who were clever at some things and not at others decided that, rather than try and understand C properly, invent another language 'based' on it. What I dislike the most is that they hijacked the terms "class", "members", "method" and "property" and re-defined them away from their originally intended meanings. Example: When these terms were first taught it was like this: "You're all students, right? You're in a class, right? So, the class is the collection of students, and the students are the member of that class." In other words, "members" was directly analogous to "objects" - i.e. when you instantiate a class you produce an object 'of' that class - e.g. of a "rectangle class" the instantiation is the "rectangle object" which is a member of the rectangle class.

But then Java came along and started telling everybody that a "member" of a class is a method or property - except they then blur that distinction and in documentation (that all IT trainers now follow) call them all members.

It made TRYING to learn Java a headache for me, because the way Sun Microsystems "redefined" these terms was wrong, wrong, wrong ... but simply because they had links with 'open source' groups and are of course a 'market leader' in their field, they influenced the world and his dog to either "catch up" with the new ways or get left behind.

Same with pretty much all languages and protocols that have appeared along with the web boom - why SHOULD I have to learn DHTML, XML, Perl, C#, DCOM, etc. etc. just to get a job in the IT industry? What's wrong with specialising in one thing and becoming a master at it, instead of a jack of all trade and master of none? It's only the IT industry that can get away with this sort of thing. It would be like a large company dealing with artists materials deciding that they will call their paint "ink" (ie. instead of "paint"), and that it's just distinguished by the fact that it's either "water-based", "oil-based" or "acrylic-based" ink. Similarly, if they then went on the talk about the application of those inks as "painting" ...

There are too many types of scripting around, and I for one would be pleased to see some consolidation.

Apart from the fact that Java and Javascript are two different things...

HEAR, HEAR!!!

I can't be bothered to look for programming jobs either - I absolutely refuse to learn VB, C++ or any sort of scripting so that's me knackered. I'll stick to Assembler because, unlike other languages, you have to get it right and perfect or your program will not work as you want it to. So what if the development cycle is longer... It will work, and work well.

Using a high level language just promotes bad programming habits IMO and I'll never be part of that

Call me foolish but .. surely Freeview.co.uk is "all you need to know about Freeview" but with a nicely-designed site and without a powerpoint-esq presentation on the front page....

Maybe, but as has been said JavaScript is not Java. It was originally named LiveScript but because of it being introduced when Java was an industry buzzword (anyone actually know why? I didn't see it as any sort of a big event) Sun thought it would make it catch on if they called it 'JavaScript'.