Review: Dreamweaver 4.0

[TechJumper]

Dreamweaver 4.0
Michael Morelli
6/10/01

Machine Tested:

PIII @ 450
Rage 128
10 GB Western digital


Sure, all of us web dev's started our roots in notepad, which is still quite useful, and soon migrated to the inevitable Front Page express, or pro. But now, after experiencing raw code, and spoon feeding (fp2000) it's time to move on to a real web development tool, and Dreamweaver is it.

CODING
The fourth edition of Dreamweaver, Macromedia loaded it with several new features that allow it to code with all Macromedia dev apps, as well as many windows applications. Easy implimentation of flash and shockwave make this product a must for anyone who has found their artistic ability flourishing with interactive movies. Macromedia's image dev tool, Fireworks, is a true partner to this edition, with several added features to make editing an existing image a breeze.

Dreamweaver allows the developer to use both pre-gen code and raw html. There are several window options: split screen (top actual view, bottom raw code), and many others.

Many of us use the popular wsftp application to put our files online. Macromedia has adapted that concept and included a full functioning ftp application with Dreamweaver, making file transfer easy and painless.

Tooling around with web development apps has just come to an end, at least for me. Dreamweaver 4.0 has proven to be a top-of-the-line product in several different ways and has won over all my current web designing projects.


Thanks,

TJ

[TechJumper]

Don't get me wrong, there are a few things about DWVR that erk me, but overall the product performs well beyond anything I have used in the past. I'd love to hear some comments on your experiences with this product...

[izzzy12k]

My partner was telling me the same thing about how much he loves Dreamweaver!

I plan to check it out soon and will keep you all posted.

-izzy

[Undertow]

I use Dreamweaver 4 UltraDev. I must say it is a wonderful program. They made it a pleasure to use, without putting a bunch of useless garbage in it, and the way it writes code is unbelievable. In my Dreamweaver class, the instructor had us import an HTML document that was made with Word, and use Dreamweaver's "Clean Up Code" feature to remove all useless garbage. The code was originally about 300 lines, after it was cleaned up it was a mere 34 lines of code. That just goes to show Dreamweaver's superior methods of writing code. I have ran into a couple of minor bugs, but that is to be expected from a program with such a demanding job. The bugs mind you did not have any affect on the outcome of my page, which keeps me happy. As far as I'm concerned, Front Page is a joke. I am on the road to becoming a top notch web master, I hope, and Macromedia is the bus to take me there. I encourage everyone who is serious about web design to pick of a copy of Dreamweaver. The amount of time it would take you to produce a page in notepad with the elaborate tabling structure such as my site, would have you going gray by the time you were done. I also love how it allows you to easily get your hands dirty and edit the raw HTML code. Like Tech said, you can only show the document, have a split window, or only show the HTML. Whats nice is in the visual editing mode you can just click where you want to edit the code, then hit the button to edit the HTML, and your cursor is right where you wanted to edit.

You can also expand Dreamweaver using the Extension Manager. I haven't used this yet but I imagine you can download some pretty cool plugins. This is very encouraging as with other programs you usually have to pay for updates or just simply buy the latest version, or give up on it altogether.

I was a bit skeptical of Dreamweaver at first, but as soon as I started using it I immediately realized its potential. I am also very glad I took a class on it, as it could be somewhat overwhelming for the novice-intermediate web designer.

If you're still out there writing HTML by hand, or using Front Page, let me tell you that you have no idea what you're missing. You can check out my site that I made with Dreamweaver at http://www.GoreGamer.com and see what took me only a couple of hours to put together. That doesn't include graphics time, but with the help of Photoshop 6 the graphics didn't take to long either. Hope this gave you a little insight, and good luck!

[izzzy12k]

Cool Site, I've gotta get a copy of Dreamweaver!

izzy

[MiKe85]

Good review tj.

I remember when i first tried Microsoft Frontpage 98 and thought that was such a great program.

Then i downloaded Dreamweaver, and realized dreamweaver blew frontpage out of the water!!

I don't think i am going to EVER go back to frontpage

[golfcart]

Dreamweaver is pretty cool. I'm still an oldschool notepad user though. I like to use dreamweaver to format my sloppy code and also for when I can't figure out how to align something the way I want. Some of the extensions you can get for it are just plain amazing.