Open Source Webflow Clone in Alpha - GrapeJS

Interesting project, but now I’m finding myself being swayed by Webflow hosting and their total infrastructure, I hate it when people make good products.

GrapeJS

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Lack of features, continued support and development would be some major concerns.

There are other options like McCaw, Pinegrow, Adobe Muse, Jetstrap, Webydo, Flux (http://www.theescapers.com/flux/) and I suppose we could even include DreamWeaver as similar options to Webflow. I’ve used Adobe Muse and tested out both Webydo and Pinegrow.

Adobe Muse is a decent tool, they have a responsive option now but I find it a bit cumbersome. The product has been advancing in features but it has taken Adobe along time to address some issues such as the wrong (alt design…phone, tablet, desktop) showing on the wrong device (prior to the responsive option being included).

Webydo I didn’t really get. Supposedly, according to the extended sales pitch I received via an inbound call, there are a number of larger agencies using Webydo to run there entire business. But I couldn’t ever find a sample of one of those, they do have white labeling and there is a new version. They have limitations as well.

Pinegrow I only tested briefly but it was at the time (probably a year ago) pretty buggy at least to my experience but it’s probably worth a second look simply because they did seem to have good tool set and sensible interface.

There are options available but people unhappy with pricing or limitations on accounts are still sticking with or coming back to Webflow which is interesting and might mean Webflow is delivering the best product.

I personally haven’t ever seen a problem with the pricing and neither have my clients. Features and integrations have been more of an issue but easily addressed. I would like to see CMS exportable and at a very minimum the data from the collections exportable…maybe someday. It would be nice to be able to import sites as well.

Why write a book? Simply pointing out a new, open source, ALPHA product that is almost a Webflow clone.

To run down your list though:

Features, support, development: It’s an alpha product, developed for free, for the community. Feel free to contribute to it, or fork it and make your own.
Macaw/Scarlet: They sold out and their product is dead.
Pinegrow: Too focused on reusable content, blocks and WordPress.
Muse: Garbage product, even with its attempt to do responsiveness.
Jetstrap, Webydo, Flux: Garbage

Nobody brought up pricing.

The limitations are severe and everyone knows it. SSL anyone?

You pointed out a new product citing it as a “clone” without being coupled to limitations and in reality it is hardly a shadow of Webflow even if it is in ALPHA. So many features missing. I thought you couldn’t honestly be trying to compare it to Webflow so tossed out some other options for you…seems you already knew of them.

It would be nice to have SSL and it’s supposedly coming. I believe there were some workarounds in the forums.

Re: GrapeJS

Interesting idea but looks far too complicated to install on mac.

Not really complicated, you just have to have some basic dev chops. For anyone who works in JS all day, it’s a treat to use and install. It’s not meant for drag/droppers without any programming background.

It’s not a product. It’s an open source application that is now available. It looks like a clone of Webflow, thats why I posted it here. I’m not intending for anyone to leave Webflow for it, frankly most people here won’t be able to figure out how it works. It’s just an interesting OPEN SOURCE project that does what Webflow does in a way that doesn’t tie you to the Webflow ecosystem.

Nobody said it was equal to Webflow in features, and it is ALPHA, which is important when you’re adamantly defending Webflow against it. It’s ALPHA. Fanboys, I swear.

There are no real workarounds for SSL in the forums, they all rely on CDN based SSL, which isn’t real SSL. The irony is that SSL as part of a SaaS/PaaS application isn’t even that hard, yet still not offered, years later.

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Certainly interesting. It seems to completely rip off Webflow in many respects. Obviously not as advanced, but on the bright side it’s cool to see what people are making! :slight_smile:

Webflow will continue to have formidable competition. I’m confident enough in their abilities to support the user base and innovate that I have switched almost all my static design and development work over to the Webflow platform.

Edit: I’m reminded of an excerpt from Vanity Fair’s Jony Ive Interview:

An audience member asked Ive how he feels about alleged copy-cat designs by companies such as the Chinese manufacturer Xiaomi.

“I’ll stand a little bit harsh, I don’t see it as flattery,” he answered. “When you’re doing something for the first time, you don’t know it’s going to work. You spend seven or eight years working on something, and then it’s copied. I have to be honest, the first thing I can think, all those weekends that I could have at home with my family but didn’t. I think it’s theft, and it’s lazy.

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I don’t see what @jwburkhard and @jdesign is fighting about. I guess both of you guys took things a little too personally. Take it easy.

But back to topic, I never really believe in open source efforts, it’s pretty messed up in the end of the day. Not to say there aren’t any good ones and well maintained out there.

I guess Webflow should be happy in a way some dude intends to copy it. All for the sake of “free”. LOL. Open source fanatics.

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So you don’t believe in open source efforts. Ridiculous. 90% of the web you use and it’s tools came from open source efforts. Like this forum you’re using. It’s open source. Look it up, called Discourse. So is the JavaScript that powers Webflow. facepalm

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Don’t get me wrong @jwburkhard. Why are you so feisty? Chill man.

Take note I called out fanatics. I don’t think any professionals in the Open Source sector would qualify as a fanatic. “Fanatics” like, extremists who blindly or misrepresents the core meaning/philosophy of Open Source. Like it or not, a large group of people always take Open Source as “free meal”; instead of the universal access to promote further innovation without the bounds of bureaucracy, politics or personal agendas. Someone’s gotta foot the bill eventually for something that’s being built.

But back to topic again, we’re deviating. I still don’t quite like the idea of this GrapeJS. Perhaps it could be developed to something else, start fresh. Blatant clone, kind of sucks and flattering at the same time. I remember once my boss told me, “if no one wants to copy our stuff, basically no one saw value in it”. He’s quite right.

Wanted to address a few points:

  1. Providing SSL at scale is pretty difficult to accomplish for a PaaS platform, especially for custom domains. It means we have to provision SSL certificates on demand (or implement a secure cert upload process while ensuring the cert is signed with enough bits), deploy them on our fleet of servers, and manage cert expiration. Not to mention the pain of managing certificate chains to make sure the pretty green icon appears correctly in your favorite browser.
  2. SSL workarounds with Cloudflare is 100% protected against Man in the Middle attacks as long as you assume the connection between Cloudflare and Webflow is secure. If anyone has other concerns about the Cloudflare implementation let us know so we can address them specifically. But as far as I know there isn’t really anything vulnerable with that approach.

PS - all of your JS and CSS assets on published Webflow sites are always delivered over SSL. And yes, we’re actively working on providing SSL to hosted Webflow sites.

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I tried the online-demo of GrapeJS and it seems like it needs some more time to get where webflow is now, but it seems they are heading in the right direction :smile:

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