Dutch software developers have been delivering some superb interactive, point and click website design environs. For example, Mobirise has a great and free JavaScript/Bootstrap 3 based Website Builder perfect for simple website applications – like a Design Portfolio, a Restaurant website, a Photo Gallery that works on mobiles, tablets, and desktops. Your editor looked at Mobirise in early 2016 and found it not ready for primetime. But just 3 weeks ago, the verdict changed as you can see with this photo gallery website:
This JavaScript SPA-Single page Applications was done in less than a day including editing the fall images.
Swifty Suite
Here is hoping another Dutch software firm developing a SiteBuilding Suite for WordPress has the same trajectory. The SwiftySite Suite was launched in May of 2016 and it shows great promise in delivering a much more simplified and easy to use site building interface for WordPress. Just another WP PageBuilder – well no, Swifty Suite goes beyond many PageBuilders in many ways.
First, SwiftySite is has a simple 3 part install – autoloading the key plugins: Swifty Designer, Swifty PageManager and Swifty Content Manager’ It also adds plus two support plugins – Yoast SEO and a Fast Secure Contact Forms which users can use or delete as they see fit.
Swifty Designer not only makes a host of Page/Post templates available for free download and use but also uses the WP Customizer interface to allow users to customize the website design extensively. Unfortunately I was unable to obtain activation/authorization so detailed testing of the Swifty Designerhas not been done.
Second,Swifty PageManager replaces the WP menu command with a better system for creating menus and managing pages:
Swifty Page manager allows users to manage page menus just as before but also to customize the styling/layout of every page that they create. This latter feature is invaluable and replaces the need for PHP page templates. Swifty PageManager is not as flexible as Headway Theme Builder which allows users to create a unique look and layout for every page and post on their websites if they so choose. But I suspect this is an innovation which will be paid the compliment of imitation by the many other competing PageBuilder vendors.
Swifty Content Creator
Swifty Content Creator goes beyond many pgaeBuilders. It provides Preset rows or sections that can be added to any page or post:
This is another PageBuilding innovation that is beginning to be adopted by other PageBuilding software vendors. The advantage for users is they can insert selected rows not a whole page template which can be overwhelming.
Swifty Content Creator has 10 free widgets and 8 premium widgets which is less then its new PageBuilding neighbors like Elementor and Forge. But more worrisome, this reviewer has the most problems with the Content Creator plugin. First, when some combination of rows and columns were deleted, the plugin would freeze up and just not work for edits on that page. Recovery required deleting the page and starting over. Second, simple drag and drop moving of columns did not work as effectively as in Themify Builder or Divi3 or Beaver Builder. Third, I could not target specific columns on the page to receive new widget content – they would always appear at the bottom of the page. Needless to say these bugs certainly slowed down Page/Post creation and reminded me of mobirise from a year ago.
But there is also good news about Swifty Content Creator. First, the full range of image tools allow for dynamic, drag-and-drop image resizing at design time which is an upcoming feature to be seen in more PageBuilders. Second, the content creator has a floating edit toolabr that can be turned on and off as required for text block editing. Third, Content Creator works well with Themify Builder as seen here:
The Accordion and Image Slider are by Themify Builder while the overall page is done by Swifty Content Creator. Another important point to note is that this reviewr found it easy to navigate through the Content Creator pages. I never got lost until page editing stalled out with a blank page on certain deletion of elements.
Summary
From this review readers can see the competition in the WordPress PageBuilder category is heating up. More vendors are taking the Swifty approach and adding not just page and row templates but also a wide array of website customizing features that work through the WP Customize command. There is innovation also on Post and Page layout options. For WordPress owners and beginners this is further proof that for ease of website creation and operation, WordPress is once again starting to lead the way. Finally, this reviewer hopes that Swifty Suite sees the Mobirise phenomenonon – stellar improvement as the bugs get squashed over time.