HTML editor web based WYSIWYG editor for CMS application

Content Management System has changed the website management rules, with CMS the website owner can manage their own website content easily with less web programming knowledgement needed, but a good website is not only about content, there many consideration factors, and one of them is content styling.

As webpage visualization is controlled by HTML and its clones (and now with CSS), this makes basic HTML and CSS knowledgement still needed while writing a website content to give ‘em styles, to make ‘em more alive. But many website owners were totally new about website they do not have any HTML/CSS skills, even the basic breakline “<br />” tag.

To eleminate this problem we need a Web-based HTML editor or even better WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) HTML editor integrated in our CMS application, most of opensource CMS application has integrated with their choosen Web-based HTML editor, PHP based CMS like Joomla, Mambo, WordPress, Driual uses TinyMCE, but for them who write their own CMS application can choose one of the opensource Web-based HTML editor below.

TinyMCE Javascript WYSIWYG editor

TinyMCE is a platform independent web based Javascript HTML WYSIWYG editor control released as Open Source under LGPL by Moxiecode. It has the ability to convert HTML TEXTAREA fields or other HTML elements to editor instances. TinyMCE is very easy to integrate into other Content Management Systems.

TinyMCE is widely used, most of PHP based opensource CMS application use it, Joomla, Mambo, Drupal, WordPress are some of them, skinable, well documented and has a lot of plugins from 3rd party contributors.

FCKeditor the texteditor for internet

FCKeditor is a WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) HTML text editor which brings to the web much of the power of desktop editors like MS Word. It’s lightweight and doesn’t require any kind of installation on the client computer.

FCKeditor released under GPL, LGPL and MPL license, it is natively supported ASP.Net, ASP, ColdFusion, PHP, Java, Active-FoxPro, Lasso, Perl, and Python, Cross browsers compatible, easy customizable, skinable, a lot of easy configuration options, well documented and the most important form me is it is supported custom CSS styling, so that you can integrated your webpage style in it to see a real preview of your webpage when it is published.

I have used FCKeditor for quite longtime, integrated in my CMS nor ecommerce application both ASP and PHP version. I have used TinyMCE as well but in my personal opinion FCKeditor easier to install and configure for beginner.

NicEdit – Inline WYSIWYG HTML editor

NicEdit is a Lightweight, Cross Platform, Inline Content Editor to allow easy editing of web site content on the fly in the browser. NicEdit Javascript integrates into any site in seconds to make any element/div editable or convert standard textareas to rich text editing.

More lightweight than TinyMCE and FCKeditor and has almost all basic features needed to be a good web based HTML editor for your CMS application. Meanwhile i am considering to use it for smaller sized website client, and so far it has given a good impression.

Damn Small Rich Text Editor

Damn Small Rich Text Editor (DSRTE) made by AvidanSoft. This piece of code creates a Rich Text Editor (“RTE”) from an IFRAME element. this is purposed to provide enough basic functionality of web based HTML editing while having the smallest footprint possible.

The code relays on the fantastic jQuery library, small, lightweight but still can be a good alternative to use if you consider more on download speed of the editor.

Markitup – universal jquery markup editor

markItUp! is a JavaScript plugin built on the jQuery library. It allows you to turn any textarea into a markup editor. Html, Textile, Wiki Syntax, Markdown, BBcode or even your own Markup system can be easily implemented.

markItUp! is not meant to be a “Full-Features-Out-of-the-Box”-editor. Instead it is a very lightweight, customizable and flexible engine made to meet the developer’s needs in their CMSes, blogs, forums or websites. markItUp! is not a WYSIWYG editor, and it never will be.

Made by Jay Salvat, simple layout, as describes above it is not a WYSIWYG editor it is a markup replacement tools, used by PivotX CMS, Redaxo CMS and Tango CMS. can be used for HTML replacement editor, BBCode, Texttile, Markdown, Wiki syntax, and dotclear oriented editor, i love the skin glossy vista styles, also available MacOSX style.