Introduction to Hotglue.

As with any new tool there is a period where experimentation must occur to find out what it can offer. After finding out that we will be using hotglue to create a portfolio to document our work it was time to have a play around.

The first thing I did was create an account on hotglue which instantly gives you your own URL and blank canvas to start working on your website.

The aim of hotglue is to give the user the power to create a website with zero previous knowledge in web-design. I feel that the tool does well in achieving that. It is incredibly basic and easy to use and both positive and negatives can be drawn from that fact.

What is hotglue?
Watch the video on the right to find out.

My first website...

It's safe to say my first website isn't exactly what anybody would actually want to view but it allowed me to test out some of the features on offer in a carefree environment.

Believe it or not this website does actually have some features!

1. - An animated background image (gif)


2. - Embedded youtube video


3. - Hyperlink to another page on the same hotglue via image


4. - Three different layered images


5. - Use of transparency through layers


6. - Text and coloured textbox

Considering all of that was done without even looking at the tutorials, it was easy enough to get the basic ball rolling and start to use the tools to create something more serious and 'professional'.

The way Hotglue works is through simple clicking, dragging and dropping. A single click brings up the menu shown below, while a double click brings up an advanced menu.

Hotglue's tools... Good?

Small menu (from top left): Create a new text object, upload a new file, embed another webpage, embed a youtube or vimeo video.

Advanced menu: Covers url changes, start page, delete page, listing pages, background options, code input etc.

As you can see there is a fairly solid range of tools to get started, but in the end you can't expect too much or you will be dissapointed.

Pro's

- Easy to use with no coding knowledge

- Can do some creative and quite cool things with a bit of imagination

- Allows for you to add your own custom code (not for beginners so isn't really a pro for who the tool is aimed at)

- Quick and effective

- Support for embedding

- A solid set of tutorials for the slightly more advanced editing

Con's

- Limited functionality

- If you accidentally delete something there is no going back

- Depending on what code you enter it can be very buggy and actually mess up the website

- Seems to interact with different devices strangely. The website doesn't fit and objects change position depending on what you view it on

- No centering or aligning options for objects so everything has to be done via eye

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