Thursday, January 24, 2013

Squarespace 5 vs. Squarespace 6

Sorry!

Happy almost payday to all you working class nerds! I know it has been two days since I have posted, but things have been a little crazy. Between taking up more hours at work, and trying to rewrite this site, I honestly have had no time to work on writing. 

Battle to the Death!




So, I have been blogging for a while, switching platforms to whatever suits my needs at the time. and a few years back, I found the beautiful SquareSpace. At the time, SquareSpace was in version 5, and it was a god send. 

Being able to edit the look of your site on the fly with little to no coding was amazing. It was insanely convenient, being able to place sidebars and change widths of everything. By the time you were done, you had a site that literally was unrecognizable from someone else's.

But, that is what Square Space was built for! Building multiple types of websites in a way with an end result of a completely unique look. Most of the things you do, or need to edit, can be achieved through a simple slider bar. 

Though, convenience costs money! Luckily, not that much though. For only 8 dollars per month, you get the basic service which provides a large amount of functionally.

Here is just one website built with the simple functionality in Square Space 5. 


Fast Forward

2012-2013 is here and Square Space has come out with version 6! For the most part, when a piece of software gets updated, it gets better. Functionalities that already exist are improved. Bugs are removed, etc. 

But for whatever reason, when Square Space updated, it removed everything. They basically started from scratch. All the functionalities that I knew and loved were all gone. Almost all the customization of your Square Space site was removed.

They even went and removed all the cool starter templates. So now you only have a handful of portfolio style templates, and you have limited customization on them. Obviously, if you know how to code (and have the time to) then you can still customize your site the same way. But, if that is the case, you might as well have a Blogger profile with css add ons.

The long and short of it, is if you want to have a plain looking site, Square Space 6 would be fine for you if you are down with the 8 dollars a month. But if you are looking to have a truly unique looking site, Square Space 5 is the way to go.

Though, just because I believe in bettering yourself constantly, I would pick up a css book anyways and use it whenever you can.

And as a last note, Square Space is constantly being updated, so in about a year or so, it will probably be in usable order. 

I Would Recommend...

I would recommend going to Square Space and trying out the free 14 day trial. See if it is right for you, and if you like it, good for you. If not then I would definitely try out the Square Space 5 trial. 

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