N|vu: An Introduction

Nvu (pronunciation: "n vue") is a cross-platform stand-alone WYSIWYG complete web authoring system. It is based on Mozilla mozilla code just like Firefox and Thunderbird. Nvu is an open source software aimed to be a true WYSIWYG editor for beginners such that the professional web authors will also find convenient and useful to use.

With Nvu installed, anyone can author and publish web pages. An expertise in the field of HTML and CSS editing ceases to be a requirement with Nvu. It offers a simple and intuitive interface for users. Being based on Mozilla, Mozilla Composer's users would feel completely at home the first time they start using it.

Nvu is currently available as a technology preview and its latest public release is 0.50. You can download it from Nvu Download page. Although it is in its early stages of development, Nvu users have started comparing it with other well established and famous web authoring products. The reason - N|vu's easy to use features:

Open Source: Nvu is Open Source software. That is, its completely free. Who needs to pay for an HTML editor if you get all the features for free.
Tabs: Nvu comes with the most popular feature available in Firefox: Tabbed Windows. With "Tabs" you can edit multiple web pages at one time in a single window
CaScadeS: Nvu brings style sheet editing as a built-in feature with its style sheet editor: CaScadeS. The markup generated is W3C valid.
Customizable Toolbars: Nvu, like Firefox, being based on Mozilla rendering engine, gives the option to customize the toolbars to suite your needs.
FTP Site Manager: Nvu has an integrated FTP site manager. You can directly upload any/all of your web pages to the server from within Nvu, thus making web site management an easy job.
Tables: Revolutionary ways to create custom tables are only available in Nvu. You can place tables anywhere you want using drag-and-drop borders with help from measuring scales on both vertical and horizontal sides.
Forms: Forms. Yes, finally you can create and edit a form in a WYSIWYG editor. Nvu provides a GUI for creating and editing forms for your web pages.
Bidi Enabled: Nvu takes into account the writing direction of languages like Arabic, Hebrew, Urdu, etc and provides an option to use Right-to-Left or Left-to-Right text writing direction.
W3C Validator: Generation of W3C valid HTML pages has never been easier. With Nvu, you can validate your web page and see the results in the Nvu-results window, without even opening a browser window just for validating.
Easy Style Editing: Nvu's status bar always shows the status of the cursor. It shows all the tags which enclose the cursor at the current position. And to edit the style properties, all you need to do is right-click on the appropriate tag in the status bar and choose desired style properties.
Text Zooming: At high monitor resolutions, text appears very small at normal size. Also, for people with difficulty in reading small text, Nvu provides the feature of "Text Zooming". Just with a Ctrl++ or Ctrl+- you can increase or decrease text size respectively.
Markup Cleaner: In case the HTML source contains unwanted tags, you can easily remove them using the "Markup Cleaner".
Syntax Highlighting: Nvu shows you the source html code in contrasting colors to easily distinguish between html tags and your text. Syntax highlighting is one of the most important features of text editors for programming.
Spell Checker: Nvu now has the inbuilt spell checker. Users won't have to re-read entire text to check for typos. Also, as its based on Mozilla Spell Checker, more language dictinaries can be added as per your requirements.
TOC: For long articles, Nvu provides easy "Table of Contents" generation with just a click of few buttons. TOC gives easy access to different sections of the article.
XFN info: You can add XHTML Friends Network information to your blog rolls, links, etc from within Nvu.

Using Nvu? If you have queries, the Nvu Forums is the place to go and get help. In case you are interested in whats happening with Nvu development on a day-to-day basis, visit the developer's web log.