TinyMCE or HTMLarea or FCKeditor in 4.6 that is the question?

This is a very interesting topic. Would also like to know this

I have done development with all three. Here's a couple of lines on each. Keep in mind that for each WYSYIWYG editor, there are two parts: the editor itself, and the drupal module that integrates it.

1) HTMLarea - is the oldest. Development on HTMLarea itself has ceased. But a branched version called Xinha continues on. I haven't used Xinha, but HTMLArea was nice - a little clunky, but overall pretty solid. I also haven't used the HTMLarea.module so I don't know what it has for settings.

2) FCKEditor - is very feature-rich with integrated image and file uploading. But FCKeditor suffers from horrible documentation and confusing code. It is really difficult to figure out how to configure it to do exactly what you want. And once it's configured, it pretty much stays that way. That makes it difficult for a Drupal module to define many settings. The fckeditor.module is pretty simple and straightforward.

3) TinyMCE - It is probably at this point that I should mention that I've done a lot of development work on Drupal's tinymce.module. TinyMCE is the most recent addition to this list. The code is very clean and well documented. It does not have quite as many features as the two editors listed above, but it is very easy to develop plug-ins and I believe that it will soon surpass the others. It loads quickly and works solidly.

TinyMCE's complete documentation has allowed us to add settings for just about all of its features into the tinymce.module. We also have a very complete system for defining profiles so that different users can have different sets of features for the editor. We allow you to define the CSS that the editor uses or have it automatically use the current theme's CSS.

The big problem when activating a rich text (wysiwyg) editor for Drupal is trying to figure out which textareas it should replace. We have gotten around this problem for the tinymce.module by a) defining an optional list of pages on which it should be active and b) offering a text link below each textarea that allows you to turn on or off the rich-text editor "on the fly". This way you can avoid the overhead of loading the editor on every page with a textarea and just "swap out" textareas when you need it. Mathias, RichardB, and I have put a lot of work into the tinymce.module. Take a look, even if you decide to go with one of the other options.

Vote of confidence for TinyMCE!

--
Etopian (Support & Hosting)
http://drupal.etopian.net

I've had character problems with TinyMCE. Reported it few weeks ago without any luck. Other than that I think TinyMCE is the editor of choice.

I've been using HTMLArea for *years*, considering it good for "advanced" beginners, but having too many complications for total neophytes. Things like Firefox generating "br" linebreaks and Internet Explorer generating "p" linebreaks while using it have always frustrated me...

FCKEditor has more features than you can shake a stick at, BUT is horribly HORRIBLY slow in Windows Firefox if the PC is slower than 1 Ghz. I tend to think that its sheer number of features is likely to freak out neophyte users too.

TinyMCE seems "just right." It is fast, configurable, has the important features of Spell Check (with ieSpell in IE in Windows, at least) and easy Image Importing. You can easily set the linebreak method, the editor size on the page, and you can always gracefully turn it on and off.

I am slowly converting all of my sites into TinyMCE sites...

-Warr

I have been frustrated with FCK editor for ages and have been waiting for a simple editor like TinyMCE.

However now that it has arrived I treid installing it but it doesn't work. I am using Drupal 4.5

Please don't tell me it only works for 4.6 becasue that would just depress me. Upgrading to 4.6 is such a dauting affair for me. I read the instructions but it's too daunting.

Is there any way to use TinyMC with 4.5

please please please say yes!

FQ

The Green Room

The combined powers of TinyMCE + image module + image_assist module rocks! :)

"If you build it, they will come." -- Field of Dreams

and when viewing what people in this thread has said it´s quite obvious :)

for us htmlarea is a much better solution then tinymce but something weird is going on with 4.6 and htmlarea/xinha for us so we had for the time being test tinymce and fck alittle more.

and in the end i have to say that i do like some of tinymce´s features/behaviours but it´s in my opinion much slower then htmlarea and fck and it´s alot less customizable (atleast when compared to htmlarea).

with that said we ended up using fck editor since it loads quicker then tinymce and the image handling is much better then tinymce (even tho i still prefer htmlareas way of doing things when it comes to that part) and we in general felt that fck was a better choice then tinymce.

just my opinion tho.

why there is not an easy way to have them all?:/

The problem I have with TinyMCE is that when you put PHP code into your pages, MCE messes it up when editing. Sure you can turn off the editor while creating a page, but if you want to edit it later and MCE is enabled by default, it'll ruin your PHP code. I tried using codefilter, but that doesn't help. So now I have to figure out a very fine-grained positive list of page types where TinyMCE is allowed to run.

Or does anyone have a different workaround?

I started with HTML area, but left it whenever heard about the discontinuation of the development.

Then I switched to TinyMCE. Yes it is simpler than FCK, but I was getting unexpected results in terms of formatting. It is kind of not generating desired outputs, so I always had to take a look at the generated HTML to understand what was going on. But you cannot expect novice users to do that.

So I switched to FCK. It was really cool, but is very very slow on my 4 years old machine. With content it is loading in about 30 seconds. I admit my machine is slow too, but it was faster for TinyMCE. But generated HTML quality is good, the result is clean. Another good thing is you can convert your css files into xml file so that all css rules turn out to be selections for formatting. I think that maybe possible in TinyMCE in some ways, but ir is well supported in FCK.

Probably I will have to switch back to TinyMCE, because speed is important as much as other features.

To me the used of RTE is mainly for image handling, to align, position the image with the text. This is important to the general population. =)

I've played with all 3 editors, all 3 are easy to install and use. But when come to image handling with drupal integration, it turns out that HTMLArea (Xinha) is the easiest to configure and use. Until now I'm still having problem the other 2 editors.

However, in term of speed, TineMCE does stand out due to its limited features. FCKeditor is bloated with unnecessary features and formatting which likely break your beautiful css style. HTMLArea stands in between them..

I have tried FCKeditor in the past in custom .php websites. It is hell for users to edit content over dialup 56k modems, it is slow on older PC's etc, it has compatibiltiy issues with browsers (Opera for example.)

Editing HTML in the standard editing box takes me back to the days of editing webpages in Notepad. :)

I would propose yet another alternative - copy and paste.

I use and external editor (Bluefish in my case) but it could be any HTML editor that allows a code preview. I create a blank HTML page (with HTML header and footer and the linked stylesheet from the Drupal theme). In this document I create any number of stories without working in the online Drupal site. Normal HTML comments separate the stories I am able to preview this document in a variety of browsers for testing. Very often I am busy with the third or fourth story when I modify aspects of the other stories (that have not been uploaded yet.) Normally I would 'compose' a batch of a mornings work in one document before entering Drupal and uploading a batch of stories (by pasting story by story into Drupal but that is the subject for another thread...).

Benefits are:

• I have found that I am more productive by a far greater margin in editing this way since I have been designing websites for years using tools I know well;
• I have far fewer modifications and edits to existing stories;
• This local 'production' document serves as a reference to how much I produced in a period of time and whether content has been created or not and I use HTML comments to indicate when I uloaded the content.;
• I can work locally on stories far in advance of their release date as well as cache content for future publishing in this way.
• I find that it is an excellent way of migrating content from non-Drupal sites to new Drupal sites;
• Personally speaking, there are distinct editing advantages in organising my train of thought before commiting my story;
• I get the best of both worlds - using industry strength web design tools that I know and I am accustomed to, while using Drupal for the website.
• For the users that perform occasional editing I could always enable FCKeditor - as long as I don't have to use it myself.
• I have the benefit of making additions to the default theme stylesheet and testing them out on the present stories!

I accept that this will not work for every person entering Drupal content, but for 'bulk editing' and for getting a lot done in the shortest amount of time, this has distinct advantages.

This tip may be obvious, but I frequently see proficient web designers painfully editing stories online in Drupal!

It would help if MCE could be controlled from input format. I would like to enable it only when the input format is HTML, not wiki or some other markup.

Web based WYSIWYG editors are still in their infancy but are growing up pretty quick. Keeping this in mind, you'll have much more realistic expectations to what these systems can do. I've used all three, and what I've come to realize is they all have there good points, and they all have there bad points.

What REALLY matters, is which one bugs you and your users the least.

Which one will you not dread having to try and support. Which ones one drive your users nuts. Well there's not 'right' answer to this. Each of us, and our user bases are different. So try them out and see which one works best for your site.

That being said, here's my take on them.

First let me preface that I would pay money (seriously) for someone to write some code that would check if the WYSIWYG module does load or doesn't then change the Input format accordingly. (e.g. User with Safari loads up the page, HTMLarea doesn't load, the code sees this and sets input format to "no editor" thus automaticly adding line breaks/paragraphs where they belong) This would avoid a two fold problem, having the Line and paragraph breaks filter on when a WYSIWYG editor is running (which often causes extra line breaks on formated html code/content copy&pasted from word, as seen in HTMLarea) and prevent posts that are just one long paragraph for those who can't use the WYSIWYG editor.

Now... On to my take on the editors ;)

HTMLarea:
This is the first one I tried. It was simple to plop into place, and easy to use, although some of the plugins/buttons options didn't seem to work as expected. Turned some buttons on and they don't show up where you think they are supposed to be, or at all. The automatic 'clean up MS Word code' feature didn't seem to work to well. Also the mixed uses of 'spans w/css' and the depreciated 'font' tag to handle colors/font-face/size was rather disappointing. Weird resizing issue when switching from "fullscreen editor" back down to normal. Doesn't work in Safari.

But even with all that, it's still very handy, and simple. Also you could specify which pages NOT to use the editor on, which I find much more effective than specifying -every- page it CAN be used on like tinyMCE does. *poke poke tinyMCE developers ;) *

FCKeditor:
Ok, so this guy... I can't really give it a fare shake. I attempted to get it installed, and had a rotten time at it. Which put me off right away... this could have been something I was doing wrong, or maybe I misread something, but even so... installation on a stock Drupal site should not cause so much headache. I finally got it install, and while it had a lot of features, it seemed slow to me, and was tricky to customize. With all that, I didn't stick around with FCKeditor for very long at all.

Again though, I've heard of other people who had similarly hard times installing HTMLarea and tinyMCE, both which I installed in a snap. So it may have just been me. As for usage... there's also plenty of people who love FCKeditor... So while you're looking into these things, don't hesitate to try out FCKeditor, you're experiance may be drasticly different than mine, and again... what really matters here is which one of these things don't drive you and your users nuts.

tinyMCE:
This is my current love affair... everything is rainbows, roses, lollipops and unicorns. Of course, I just recently switch over to tinyMCE on a community site I host, but I think I may like this one the most. It was a breeze to setup, it's seems simple/clean.

I would like to be able to customize the tool bar in an eaiser way, but I hear that's coming in the version for 4.7. The only other 'big' complaint I have at the moment with it so far is... I don't want to have to say which pages it's ok to display on, I want to list the much fewer pages I -don't- want it to display on. Also it uses the "font" tag for colors :( like HTMLarea does. Also there's some font encoding issues that I'm not sure if I like yet or not...

Anyway, I hope this helps you find the one that bugs you the least. ;)

Lycros.
realmportal.com

I too had trouble with formatting in TinyMCE. FCKEditor is slow to load but I like its formatting and especially handling paste as text and paste from Word. I've not been able to get image loading to work in FCKEditor, but then i don't like image handling in Drupal either.

I'm going with FCKEditor for now. I modified the supplied module by replacing/adding the following code (offered here for those who know what they are doing, not as a supported contrib):

function fckeditor_filter($op, $delta = 0, $format = -1, $text = '') {
  switch ($op) {
  case 'list':
    return array(0 => t('FCKEditor'));
      
  case 'description':
    return t('Makes FCKEditor (more discretely known as "the rich text editor") available for this format.');
   
  case 'prepare':
    return $text;
    
  case 'process':
    return $text;
    
  default:
    return $text;
  }
}


function fckeditor_filter_tips($delta, $format, $long = false) {
  if ($long) {
    $message = 'The rich text editor is available for this format if <ul><li>the editor has been enabled by your system administrator</li><li>it is turned on for this type of field (body, log etc...)</li><li>it is not turned off for this path (i.e. the "command" that follows the site URL)</li><li>you have not temporarily disabled it with the checkbox just above the editor (or where it would appear)</li><li>your role (user type) have sufficient access permission to the editor</li><li>you are using a compatible browser (this current browser is ';
    if ( ! fckeditor_is_compatible_client() ) {
       $message .=  'NOT ';
    }
    $message .= ' compatible)</li></ul><br />Phew!<br \>Use all the facilities of the editor except images.  For that capability please use the image icon below the text box';
    return $message;

  } else {

    return t('The rich text editor is available for this format if... (see ' .
              l('here', 'filter/tips' ).
              ')'  );
  }
}

/**
 * Implementation of textarea
 */
function fckeditor_textarea($op, $name) {

  if ( $op == 'pre' ) {

    $_SESSION['fckeditor_active']  = FALSE;
    //++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    //the types of field supported : make these config checkboxes one day
    //break = we edit it, return = we don't
    //we log any new types so they may be added to the code
    switch ($name) {
    case 'body':
      break;
    case 'caption':   //on images
      return;
    case 'components':
      return;
    case 'ec_order_overview':
      return;
    case 'fckeditor_exclude':
      return;
    case 'help':   //on project_project
      break;
    case 'log':
      return;
    case strpos($name,'nodewords')==0:
      return;
    case 'pages':
      return;
    case strpos($name,'payment')==0:
      return;
    case strpos($name,'shipping')==0:
      return;
    case 'signature':
      break;
    case strpos($name,'theme_setting')==0:
      return;
    default:
      watchdog( 'fckeditor', t('unknown textarea name: ').$name , WATCHDOG_NOTICE);
      return; 
    }

    //++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    //is the user allowed to
     if ( ! user_access('use fckeditor')) {
       return;
    }

    //++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    //the block of Drupal paths in which fckeditor is NOT used
    $page_path = drupal_get_path_alias($_GET['q']);
    $paths_excluded_array = explode("\n", variable_get("fckeditor_exclude", ''));
    $path_match = 1;
    $Number_of_excludes = count($paths_excluded_array)+1;
      // check each array item to see if it matches an excluded path
    for ($i=0; $i<$Number_of_excludes; $i++){
      $paths_excluded_array[$i] = rtrim($paths_excluded_array[$i]);
        // IF WILDCARD in excluded path
      if (strpos( $paths_excluded_array[$i] , '*' )){
        //remove /* frpm excluded_path
        $excluded_path = substr($paths_excluded_array[$i], 0, -2);
         // see if the page path contains the excluded path
        if (substr_count ( $page_path, $excluded_path)){
          return;
        }
      }else{
         //IF no wildcard check to see if Page path = excluded path
        if ($paths_excluded_array[$i] == $page_path){
          // print "exact match";
          return;
        }
      }//if strpos
    } //for

    //++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    //is the filter on for this format
    //it is UGLY that we have to go through this just to find the current format!
    for ($i = 0; $i <= 6; $i++) {
      if ( intval(arg($i) > 0 ) ) {
        //and I DONT like all this database I/O
        if ( ! db_result(db_query('SELECT n.format FROM {node} n INNER JOIN {filters} f 
                                    WHERE n.nid = %d AND n.format = f.format AND f.module = "fckeditor"', arg($i)))) {
          return;
        }
      }
    }
    //++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    //if we survived all that AND....
    if ( variable_get('fckeditor_enabled', TRUE) && fckeditor_is_compatible_client() ) {

      $_SESSION['fckeditor_active']  = TRUE;

      if ( ! isset( $_SESSION['fckeditor_user_enabled'])  ) {
        $_SESSION['fckeditor_user_enabled']  = TRUE;
      }         
      $action = '';
      if(isset($_GET['action'])) {
        $action = $_GET['action'];
      }
      if ($action == 'enable') {
        $_SESSION['fckeditor_user_enabled']  = TRUE;
      } elseif ($action == 'disable') {
        $_SESSION['fckeditor_user_enabled']  = FALSE;
      }
      $prompt = $_SESSION['fckeditor_user_enabled'] ?  'disable' : 'enable' ;
      $output = l( t('['.
                     $prompt .
                     ' the rich-text editor' .
                     ($_SESSION['fckeditor_user_enabled']  ?  '  e.g. before inserting images' : '' ) .
                     ': PLEASE SUBMIT ANY CHANGES FIRST]'),
                  $_GET['q'], 
                  NULL,    //attributes
                  'action=' .  $prompt );
      }

  } elseif ( $op == 'post' ) {


      if ($_SESSION['fckeditor_active']  &&  $_SESSION['fckeditor_user_enabled']) {
        $output .= "<script>document.getElementById('edit-$name').style.display = 'none';</script>";
	  $output .= fckeditor_create_editor($name);
      }

  }    //if op = post

  return $output;
}




/**
 * Implementation of hook_setting().
 */
function fckeditor_settings() {

	$output = form_textfield(
		t("Base Path"), 
		"fckeditor_base_path", 
		variable_get("fckeditor_base_path", 'modules/fckeditor/lib/'), 
		60, 255, t('The directory which contains FCKEditor scripts'));
		
 	$output .= form_checkbox(
		t('fckeditor enabled'), 
		'fckeditor_enabled', 
            1,
		variable_get('fckeditor_enabled', TRUE),
		t('fckeditor turned on or off.'));

	$output .= form_select(
		t('Toolbar'), 
		'fckeditor_toolbar', 
		variable_get('fckeditor_toolbar', 'Default'), 
		array('Default' => 'Default', 'Basic' => 'Basic'), 
		t('The toolbar set.'));

	$output .= form_select(
		t('Skin'), 
		'fckeditor_skin', 
		variable_get('fckeditor_skin', 'default'), 
		array('default' => 'Default', 'silver' => 'Silver', 'office2003' => 'Office 2003'), 
		t('The toolbar set.'));

	$output .= form_checkbox(
		t('Toolbar start expanded'), 
		'fckeditor_toolbar_start_expanded', 
            1,
		variable_get('fckeditor_toolbar_start_expanded', 'true'), 
		t('The toolbar start expanded or collapsed.'));

	$output .= form_textfield(
		t("Height"), 
		"fckeditor_height", 
		variable_get("fckeditor_height", 500), 
		10, 10, t("height (pixels/percent)"));
		
	$output .= form_textfield(
		t("Width"), "fckeditor_width", 
		variable_get("fckeditor_width", '100%'), 
		10, 10, t("width (pixels/percent)"));

    $output .= form_textarea(
        t('Implement fckeditor on every page except the listed pages'), 'fckeditor_exclude',
        variable_get("fckeditor_exclude", 'admin/*'),
        40, 5,
        t("Enter the paths of the pages you don't want fckeditor implemented on. Enter one page per line as Drupal paths.  The '*' character is a wildcard. Example paths are '<em>admin/settings/fckeditor</em>' for the fckeditor settings page and '<em>admin/*</em>' for every admin page."));

	return $output;
}  

HI All,
How can I make the tinyMCE appear for the description of a taxomony description textarea.

Thanks for any help
Rudy