The latest version of Dreamweaver provides updated visual layout tools, as well as improved application development features and code editing support, which should help you to create standards-based sites and applications more quickly. Its workflow improvements are more efficient, it is faster, easier to use, and even more powerful than the previous version, Dreamweaver MX. Dreamweaver 8 is a sophisticated Web design program that best serves professionals incorporating multimedia elements and database-driven content into their sites. Amateurs should perhaps stick with a less complicated application, such as Macromedia's HomeSite or Microsoft's FrontPage.

Pros: Optimised workflows; new zoom, guides and code collapse tools
Cons: Expensive; complicated and expensive for amateurs


Macromedia has recently updated its entire range of high-end Web design and development tools, including Dreamweaver, Flash, Fireworks, Contribute and FlashPaper. We've got all of the products in for review, but have started the ball rolling with the program we use most frequently on a day-to-day basis - Dreamweaver. The software is available as a stand-alone product or as a component of Macromedia's Studio 8 (£699 ex. VAT), which also includes Flash Professional 8, Fireworks 8, Contribute 3, and FlashPaper 2. Longtime users of Macromedia Studio MX and Studio MX 2004 will immediately notice the big swap in Macromedia Studio 8: FreeHand is out and Contribute is in.

In case you're new to Dreamweaver, or to Web development, the software lets you create entire Web sites. Its visual editing features let you create Web pages without writing a line of code, or you can work entirely in code if preferred. You can view all your site elements or assets and drag them directly into a document. You can also import images directly into Dreamweaver, as well as add Flash assets to Web pages.

In addition to drag-and-drop features that help you build Web pages, Dreamweaver provides a full-featured coding environment that includes code-editing tools (such as code colouring, tag completion, a coding toolbar, and code collapse) and language reference material on Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), JavaScript, ColdFusion Markup Language (CFML), and other languages. Macromedia's Roundtrip HTML technology imports your hand-coded HTML documents without reformatting the code; you can then reformat code with your preferred formatting style.

Dreamweaver also lets you build dynamic, database-driven Web applications using server technologies such as CFML, ASP.NET, ASP, JSP, and PHP. If your preference is for working with XML data, Dreamweaver provides tools that let you easily create XSLT pages, attach XML files, and display XML data on your Web pages. Finally, you can create your own objects and commands, modify keyboard shortcuts, and even write JavaScript code to extend Dreamweaver capabilities with new behaviours, Property inspectors, and site reports.

The first thing you'll notice about Dreamweaver 8 is its streamlined interface, which is easier to use than Dreamweaver MX. There's also a range of new visual tools that simplify the integration of XML-based content like RSS feeds into Web sites and applications using a drag-and-drop workflow. Other key advancements include improved code hinting for XML and Extensible Stylesheet Language Transformations (XSLT). Simply point a Web page to an XML file or a URL of an XML feed and Dreamweaver will introspect it to enable dragging and dropping the appropriate fields onto the page.

Dreamweaver 8 makes it a lot easier to work with CSS, thanks to the new unified CSS panel that provides a more intuitive way to understand a CSS file and how the cascade of styles applies to content. The CSS panel also enables you to quickly make changes without having to navigate code through trial and error. Dreamweaver now fully supports advanced CSS techniques, such as overflow, pseudo-elements, and form elements. However, you still cannot preview the content of the iFrame within the Dreamweaver workspace.

The program sports optimised workflows. The new zoom (up to 6400 per cent) and guides tools let you inspect images and get control over more complicated designs at the pixel level and measure distances between objects in design compositions. There's also a new code collapse tool so you can focus on specific code, and a new coding toolbar to access common coding functions.

For example, you can collapse an entire table or all of the code in a 'div' tag to focus on the code that you actually want to edit. Buttons to collapse or expand tags are located on the new coding toolbar, which brings other longstanding functions (like code snippets) to the surface of the workspace. Added Flash Video into a Web site is easier too, and there's added support for ColdFusion MX 7 and PHP 5.

Macromedia hasn't forgotten about the little things either. You can now compare page layouts using guides to measure page layouts (visual feedback helps measure distances accurately and supports intelligent snapping), and the new code toolbar surfaces common coding operations in a gutter bar along the side of the coding surface - no more hunting through menus and panels to find code snippets. We also really like the new code collapse feature that lets you focus only on the code in use by hiding and expanding blocks of code by selection or by tag.

The company has improved Dreamweaver 8's internal rendering engine so that your design more closely reflects how the pages will appear in a Web browser, eliminating potential alignment problems. In our tests, the design pages mimicked exactly what we saw in Internet Explorer and Firefox. You can compare two local files, a file on the local computer and one on a remote computer, or two files on the remote computer, and with the new pasting options you can retain all the source formatting created in Microsoft's Word, or just paste the text. [9]

BIOS, Sep 23, 05 | Print | Send | Comments (0) | Posted In Internet