'Blocks' is a
RapidWeaver plugin by YourHead Software
and
it's a wonder of the modern world. It lets
you simply place a 'block' of something
anywhere on the page, like a DTP
application. It works in the main content
part of
any template, leaving
the header, sidebar and navigation unchanged. A
block can contain text, image text, an image,
another page, or a snippet of prewritten code
like the nifty Digg panel on the right, which I
cut from this page and pasted into the sidebar.
It'll even allow you to drag a picture into a
text box like
this so that if the
text is resized in the browser, the graphic
flows along with it. Blocks is a must-have for
RapidWeaver—it gives you the ability to easily
do some things that would be very hard to do
with HTML. The Blocks plugin is a mini design
environment on its own, and while it's a lot
simpler than an actual design environment like
inDesign or, come to that, Freeway, Blocks
provides an impressive range of adjustments
such as margin, padding, borders, background
and more. Like many Cocoa applications such as
Intaglio, Pages etc, Blocks has 'smart guides'
which pop up only when two or more items are
aligned on any edge—I find this hugely useful,
and typical of the kind of seemingly effortless
useability and 'give the customer more than
they expected' ethos of these small Cocoa
applications.
The
Inspector also has a great rollover feature:
you can drag in a photo, then use the Inspector
to choose the 'over' photo. Rollovers were
never easier than that. And one of the best
bits: you can set up a Blocks page to act as a
Master page and any page you make using this
Master can be changed, all at once, by simply
editing the Master. Bliss.
The Blocks plugin cost me $24.95 which, at the present exchange rate, is a lot of functionality for not much money. Oh and finally, it'll let you do columns like this!
The Blocks plugin cost me $24.95 which, at the present exchange rate, is a lot of functionality for not much money. Oh and finally, it'll let you do columns like this!
