By Sheree Gustawes

PowerPoint Presentation

Summary of Product:

Microsoft FrontPage provides you with the ability to create your own Web sites and also provides features and tools that allow you to easily enhance your Web pages and verify and repair the links that make up your site.

Benefit Statement:

Microsoft FrontPage version 2002 provides the best value in its category. It has integrated features for Web site creation, Web site management, instant team Web sites with the SharePoint Team Services team Web solution, e-commerce, and graphics editing built right in.  You can get started quickly with FrontPage because it looks and works like Microsoft Office. As part of the Microsoft Office family of products, it shares similar toolbars, menus, Task Pane, clipboard, and familiar features such as the Customizable Themes and background spell checking.


 

Manufacturer info:

Technical specifications and compatibility:

The recommended system configuration for Microsoft FrontPage® version 2002 is a computer running Microsoft Windows® XP Professional with a Pentium III processor and 128 megabytes (MB) of RAM. Below are the minimum requirements your computer needs to run FrontPage 2002.

Additional Requirements

There are additional items or services required to use certain features:

§                        Multimedia computer for sound and multimedia effects (accelerated video card or MMX processor will improve graphical rendering performance)

§                        For speech recognition (available for U.S. English only):

o                                Pentium II 400-MHz or higher processor

o                                128 MB of RAM or more

o                                Close-talk microphone and audio output device

§                        Microsoft Exchange, Internet SMTP/POP3, IMAP4, or other MAPI-compliant messaging software required to use e-mail features

§                        Some Internet functionality may require Internet access and payment of a separate fee to a service provider (local or long-distance charges may apply); some Internet functionality may require Web server software, available separately from Microsoft and other third-party vendors

§                        14,000 or higher-baud modem

§                        Graphics tablet recommended for handwriting input features

§                        Some database features require Microsoft Access or another ODBC-compliant database

Setup and Installation:

You can install Microsoft FrontPage 2002 on a computer running Microsoft Windows 98, Windows NT 4.0., Windows 2000, and Windows XP. Microsoft FrontPage can be purchased as a stand-alone product on its own CD-ROM, or it can be purchased as part of the Microsoft Office XP Special Edition.

To install FrontPage, follow these steps:

1. Start your computer. Then insert the FrontPage or Microsoft XP Office CD in the CD-ROM drive. The CD-ROM should auto start, providing you with the opening installation screen (for either FrontPage or Office, depending on the CD you are working with).       

2. If the CD-ROM does not auto start, choose Start, Run. in the Run dialog box, type the letter of the CD-ROM drive, followed by setup (for example, d:\setup). If necessary, use the Browse button to locate and select the CD-ROM drive and the setup.exe program.

3. When the Setup Wizard prompts you, enter your name, organization, and CD key in the appropriate box.

4. Choose Next to continue.

5. The next wizard screen provides instructions to complete the installation. Complete the installation, select Next to advance from screen to screen after providing the appropriate information requested by the wizard.

After you complete the installation from the CD, icons for FrontPage and any other Office applications you may have installed will be provided on the Windows Start menu.

Within a matter of minutes you can be designing a website!

Training and Support:

There are many resources available:

Microsoft offers many types of support. You can get expert guidance on using and troubleshooting Microsoft FrontPage, including answers to common questions, support online or by telephone, how-to articles, and more. If you need an immediate answer, try posting a question to the FrontPage Community Newsgroups, search the Microsoft Knowledge Base, or look up a Microsoft Support telephone number.

There are many other helpful resources available, such as a FrontPage 2002 tour and FrontPage 2002 interactive demo. These items will give you the feeling that you know the product before ever using it.

Add-in product:

One of the best new features of Microsoft FrontPage 2002 is actually an add-in, the bCentral Commerce Manager. With a bCentral account, you can create a catalog, process credit card orders, and track your orders through its Order Manager.

Costs:  The new-user price is $169.00 and the upgrade price is $89.95 FrontPage is also available in an Office suite package, the package is the Developer package and comes with a price of $799.00 for the full version and $549.00 for the upgrade. These prices are from ordering directly from Microsoft, you can find different prices by shopping around at places like Amazon.com and other authorized retailers.

Product Reviews:

The first review that I found was from CNET. In a poll, CNET asked whether users would recommend or not recommend FrontPage 2002. Of 88 users, 67% recommend this product. CNET believes that FrontPage is a great product for new web builders to create sophisticated looking web sites. They also feel that FrontPage would be perfect for small businesses. The team likes the new features that FrontPage 2002 has to offer, but reminds users that your server has to support FrontPage Server extensions for this feature to work.

Click to read the review CNET                                           

The next review comes from Epinions.com. In this review, the author rated the product four out of five stars. The author claims that FrontPage 2002 is “all you need for basic and intermediate design for personal or corporate sites”. This person has used FrontPage’s competitor Dreamweaver, and still feels that FrontPage does a wonderful job. This author also warns that not all servers support FrontPage extensions, so check with your provider before designing.

Click to read the review Epinions.com

Summary:

Overall FrontPage is a great program for creating web pages, especially for the beginner. The best recommendation is to be sure that your server supports FrontPage Extensions before getting started. Other than that, there are plenty of resources out there if you get stuck, use them for guidance. FrontPage 2002 can make even the newest beginner look like a professional.