Hey RW4allers,
This week we take a look at responsive images and how RapidWeaver Elements resizes images on the fly, right in the app. We also spend a little time look at the new text shadow feature.
Thanks to @Marten for suggesting we post the weekly video updates here, it’s much appreciated. We’re looking froward to hearing what you all think.
We’ll be back next Tuesday with another update.
Thanks,
Dan & Team Realmac
The simple fact that RW Elements will not cater to any external (warehoused) assets makes Elements a total non-starter for me.
Due to this major oversight, the size of an Elements site document will become huge and unmanageable over time for anybody building sites like mine that currently stand at over 250 pages.
As a consequence I feel that rather than RW moving into the next realm of web development, RM is taking a retrograde step backwards to appeal to web development hobbyists rather than professional developers.
RW Elements will not cater to any external (warehoused) assets
Good point. That’ll definitely be a non-starter for professionals who have large websites like yourself. I’m currently designing a 120 page website. Without a warehousing option I’d be totally stymied.
I watched an Elements update video a few weeks ago and was stunned to see a whole video being dedicated to showing how to use system font and ttf fonts. I felt as if I had fallen into a time crack and reappeared in 2014.
The next video announced that effectively the idea of running stacks modified to run in Elements was put to rest with the bombshell that the stacks converted to Elements would only be at best 90% functional. I understand Elixir promptly announced that his stacks would need a total rewrite and pulled out of what was a very silly and premature idea in the first place (now 2 years ago).
RIP any notion of any stacks running in Elements.
Now there are no external assets!
Elements appears to have become pretty front end to theme customisation with limited functionality. It is iWeb 2024 and nothing more.
Let’s keep this thread focused on Paul’s original comment.
I strongly suspect that’s the target market.
Do “Professional developers” even use RW? I doubt it. I know there are plenty of us using it to make commercial sites with, but I would never class us as professional developers.
At the end of the day, why do people want another Stacks builder? Users have Stacks Pro coming for that. RW is going in its own direction, something it should have done years ago, so all power to them. Time for some long-term RW users to accept the product is moving in a direction that doesn’t work for them and just move on.
I think Elements looks great, and will get it, along with Stacks Pro. I also recently got Blocs too. Variety is the spice of life. And website building!
I totally agree. I mentioned/ranted a few weeks ago that professionals will always use the best tool available for the latest job.
I would definitely consider you — and many others on this and other forums — professional. You’re the best at what you do and you get paid for it.
Hey @Marten, @paul.rowe, @TemplateRepo,
Thanks for all the feedback so far, this is all really helpful.
We’ve been chatting internally about Warehousing again and want to make sure we’re doing the right thing. It is something we could support, we just didn’t see the benefits when Elements handles it all so seamlessly… however, we can be persuaded!
Can you guys let us know exactly why and how you using warehousing? especially on larger sites, with 100’s of pages.
Keep in mind that Element projects open instantly, leave your files intact, and there is no duplication of files, or mangling of file names. It’s a really smart solution. You also get full control in the resources area, just like you would the finder. RapidWeaver handles all the linking so if you change a name of a resource it gets updated throughout your site. There’s an older video where we demo galleries and on the fly conversion of a 100 images, it’s all pretty magical and worth a watch.
We want Elements to be the best possible product, that’s why we’re building Elements in the open and asking for feedback, so let’s have it, give us your best arguments for why warehousing should be included in Elements! We’re all ears.
A recent client of mine (192 pages) already had the warehousing of all their images in place, and had no interest in storing them in any other way. I got the job.
As such, I think clients’ needs should also be taken into account. Warehousing or not may be the difference between getting a job or not.
Dan
The following points as to why I always elect for warehousing in preference to including assets within a project file:
Features / Benefits of warehousing include:
Much smaller RW Project file sizes - very useful if working remotely on a limited capacity laptop
Much faster editing times due to lack of local assets
Back-up of project files do not require the backing up of assets as they are warehoused - important where several back-ups are maintained and particularly with large sites with thousands of images, videos, pdfs etc etc
Much easier asset manipulation via FTP
Ability to update assets on the server without the need to open RW and republish each time
The possibility to integrate a CDN more easily and efficiently should such a future choice be made
I have a RW project that is currently 39 Mb. I warehouse all my materials (PDFs, images, audio) except videos in which case I embed YT and other videos. If I did not warehouse my materials then the size of my project file would be about 2 Gb instead of 39 Mb. Oh, yea, that’s going to be fun to back up! Or to wait when I have to re-upload all files for some reason.
Honestly if RM can’t see the huge advantages of using warehoused materials then they collectively are suffering from an acute lack of imagination.
In addition to this lack of imagination, essentially you want us to do your work for you! Dan: you’re doing a great job of selling me on Stacks Pro!
Thanks for all the candid replies so far, it’s very helpful.
We’re going to dig into this further and dissect all the feedback this week. We’ll keep you all posted on the outcome.
I remember people arguing about this 10 years ago.
It’s appalling that this is even a debate in 2024. As a professional photographer, no warehousing is a 100% dealbreaker.
Maybe a combination of image macro & links to resources (i.e. resource images not embedded in project file)
It’s not even a debate. It’s a broken tablet tossed from a burning bush. An edict full of nothing but a waste of time. A judgement declared by a jury of puppets dancing at their own wake. Where have we seen this before, history repeating itself?
Maybe my therapist is right, that Realmac’s ‘reasoning’ lately feels like a shaky finger hovering over a self-destruct button. I mean, how long did it take to decide what had already been decided anyway? At least several minutes. Which is all it takes to totally ignore all the requested warehousing suggestions — even those from a Realmac team member — and then shift the blame onto Isaiah and Stacks, followed by another ‘reason’ to do nothing at all. Even though I’m old and ‘too tired for this shit’, I’m still aware that reasoning requires a modicum of logical thought… but hey, nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!
“Warehousing came about because stacks does a terrible job of managing images”.
What? Really? Kick a man when he’s down? Again? It’s hard to be virtuous and accepting when all I can hear is another glib-nib scratching parchment as history rewrites itself once again. Gaslighting anyone? I’m beginning to believe my own lies.
Of course, there are none so deaf as those who will not hear — so I’ll keep the rest of my purple prose for my shopping list. In the meantime, it’s now official! rw4all is the Real Peoples’ Forum for soothsayers and real professionals.
I wonder what our members think about this ‘response’ to the ‘warehousing’ non-option…
Hey @Marten, we think you’ve jumped the gun here a little, that comment was made before we asked for feedback on warehousing. If you read that after, we can see how that might have come across. Our last comment was saying “we’re going to discuss it” and we did just that…
At the end of last week we dissected all the feedback and are now in the process of adding built-in support for warehousing. We hope to have something to demo on Tuesday. While this isn’t our grand-vision (that will come later), it is something that brings it up and slightly above the status quo.
This was also only ever about the built-in Elements, there’s nothing stopping third-parties from implementing warehousing just like they do now in RapidWeaver Classic and Stacks. We should have also made that clearer, but sometimes when you’re in the midst of it all it’s easy to forget now everyone can see the whole picture. Sorry about that.
See you next Tuesday for a warehousing demo!
Ultimately, RM’s passive-aggressive arrogance, nonchalance towards users’ needs and attacks against a man who kept them alive for many years will turn against them. Even their new customers will figure them out sooner or later.
The lack of spine is bound to cause a collapse.
I don’t understand the situation of intolerance that has arisen in this forum.
In rw4all we have always talked about any type of application without problems.
This forum is named after RW otherwise it would be called sp1all and not rw4all.
RW is involving its users in this new project, honestly, in a way I’ve never seen. He listens, interacts, intervenes and where there is the possibility he modifies and inserts the modifications and suggestions of its users into the app, even if not shared by everyone, other things will certainly be important to some, but it is normal… but let’s consider the What’s the work behind it?
I would say excellent, I would like to say that I would also prefer there to be a native CMS in ELEMENT, I suggested it… they are evaluating it… and I understand the work that goes into it.
But I’m not critical regardless.
And then it seems illogical to me when you reply to RW with Stacks Pro…
What is it? Where? What is it and how does it work?
How can you criticize RW by talking about an app that doesn’t exist today and you don’t have any news, actually maybe in April you will be able to have news but for a fee…
I like how RW is working, the problem is that others don’t work the same way.
So GOOD news on how ELEMENT is progressing.