>creating my first web site. just want some general direction.
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>2) some people use frontpage, others say use nothing but pure html. i am looking for opinions on this issue.
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I usually use FrontPage to get an idea of what the HTML code for a more complicated page will look like. Then I copy that code into my "real" html page that I manually edit. I'm sure everything can be done through a HTML editor (Frontpage or something else), but for me it's easier to manually make changes directly.