[Madrag]

at first look, it looks good, but my first impression is that it does seem to be a text editor on steroids
I'm testing it further and see if I'll change my opinion, but ATM I think DreamWeaver is much better, unless Code is better for a finishing up, because a new document seems harder to do in Coda...

[mdc]

After playing with it for an hour or so last night I've realized that it's a great application and will probably buy it.

I don't use dreamweaver since I hand code everything, yet I like the idea of projects in dreamweaver with automatic ftp uploads and stuff like that.

I stopped using css edit and use smultron for html and css editing. Often I'm working on php pages which don't render on my local computer so I'm editing files off an ftp server. Often I find myself refreshing safari and not seeing changes because I forgot to upload the saved document.

[Aron Peterson]

Originally Posted by mdc 

I don't use dreamweaver since I hand code everything

Some people. Why is it that in 2007 and on a Mac forum, where by logical extension lots of web designers and coders hang out, I'm finding people who don't know much about industry standard software like Dreamweaver?

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

Some people. Why is it that in 2007 and on a Mac forum, where by logical extension lots of web designers and coders hang out, I'm finding people who don't know much about industry standard software like Dreamweaver?

Because Dreamweaver's original selling point was a WYSIWYG editor, and is now a very expensive text editor. I just don't see how it is worth the money for generating dynamic database/CMS driven content, when there is a myriad of other text editors available.

[Aron Peterson]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Because Dreamweaver's original selling point was a WYSIWYG editor, and is now a very expensive text editor. I just don't see how it is worth the money for generating dynamic database/CMS driven content, when there is a myriad of other text editors available.

LOL. Bess, this time I'm calling you a badly informed free software commie with a severe grudge against commercial software you know little about. Dreamweaver is literally responsible for creating the code behind 90% of dynamic database driven websites out there and for building content managers from scratch. It was never sold primarily as a WYSIWYG tool. That is just one of it's features and not even an important one because Dreamweaver VERY obviously wants you to check your code in external browsers via VERY clearly placed button that launches your pages in a browser of your choice.

Just quit this sh!t while you're behind. It's so tiresome dealing with people who haven't coded anything worth looking at while putting down the tools that the majority of successful and renowned designers use.

[Madrag]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Because Dreamweaver's original selling point was a WYSIWYG editor, and is now a very expensive text editor. I just don't see how it is worth the money for generating dynamic database/CMS driven content, when there is a myriad of other text editors available.

I disagree. I believe DW is now even more of a WYSIWYG editor than a text editor...

I do most of the code manually, but with DW I have a clear sense of what I'm doing visually (split panel, and the selection is highlighted in both panes, something that Coda doesn't seem to do).

It all depends on the kind of web work you do: if you design and produce, DW is the tool. If you integrate, then I suppose other tools may be more appropriate. (I mainly design and produce the html, I don't integrate it with the database, etc, so I don't know if DW is the right tool – although I've seen other programmers that integrate, that use it).

I find that Coda isn't even suitable to finish up... I'm very disappointed after some hours of use...
I'll continue to use it to let some time pass and to "forget" some DW vice...

[Madrag]

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

(...) It was never sold primarily as a WYSIWYG tool. That is just one of it's features and not even an important one because Dreamweaver VERY obviously wants you to check your code in external browsers via VERY clearly placed button that launches your pages in a browser of your choice.(...)

I also disagree with that...
If DW didn't have such a good WYSIWYG, why not use a text editor instead?
these also require you to do extensive testing on a browser, they just don't have any button/shortcut to do it (some do).

For me it's one of the most important features.
Another is the browser validation/error detection; auto-completion and the now very good CSS edition

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

LOL. Bess, this time I'm calling you a badly informed free software commie with a severe grudge against commercial software you know little about. Dreamweaver is literally responsible for creating the code behind 90% of dynamic database driven websites out there and for building content managers from scratch. It was never sold primarily as a WYSIWYG tool. That is just one of it's features and not even an important one because Dreamweaver VERY obviously wants you to check your code in external browsers via VERY clearly placed button that launches your pages in a browser of your choice.

Just quit this sh!t while you're behind. It's so tiresome dealing with people who haven't coded anything worth looking at while putting down the tools that the majority of successful and renowned designers use.

How could you possibly substantiate this Aron? 90%? Is this just your gut feeling?

If you want to put me in my place, make a solid and coherent argument that explains what Dreamweaver offers people who work in CMSes where there are no physical pages represented in files, where the bulk of the work is coding in various languages, and where the content is database driven?

I've heard some solid benefits to using Dreamweaver (e.g. code completion and such), but few that justify its $200 price tag (or whatever it is) to me. If you feel that DW is worth it to you, great, you should continue to use it, but there are legitimate reasons in feeling that this is not justified in light of all of the other tools available.

Cool it with your grudge. I'm simply the kind of guy that doesn't beat around the bush in these sorts of technical discussions based on an assumption that people are not emotionally attached to these subjects to require careful diplomacy.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

Just quit this sh!t while you're behind. It's so tiresome dealing with people who haven't coded anything worth looking at while putting down the tools that the majority of successful and renowned designers use.

This is also a dangerous and counter-productive line of discussion to get into, I suggest you dropping this.

However, oddly enough, this free software communist has somehow found it in himself to design an Apple website: Witz Apple Certified Training . Maybe my pigeon-hole needs some work?

[Visnaut]

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

Some people. Why is it that in 2007 and on a Mac forum, where by logical extension lots of web designers and coders hang out, I'm finding people who don't know much about industry standard software like Dreamweaver?

Come now, the same argument could be made for the entire Mac platform.

I find Dreamweaver to be bloatware, and generally a hinderance. Its preview is useless, especially if you're working on cross-browser/platform compatible sites, which end up looking like ass in its own preview window after a while.

Its code editor is generally pretty nice, but I prefer nimble apps that focus on their purpose.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Madrag 

I disagree. I believe DW is now even more of a WYSIWYG editor than a text editor...

I do most of the code manually, but with DW I have a clear sense of what I'm doing visually (split panel, and the selection is highlighted in both panes, something that Coda doesn't seem to do).

It all depends on the kind of web work you do: if you design and produce, DW is the tool. If you integrate, then I suppose other tools may be more appropriate. (I mainly design and produce the html, I don't integrate it with the database, etc, so I don't know if DW is the right tool – although I've seen other programmers that integrate, that use it).

I find that Coda isn't even suitable to finish up... I'm very disappointed after some hours of use...
I'll continue to use it to let some time pass and to "forget" some DW vice...

Well, I'm moving out of design work, so your overview/summary does apply to me. I've also become so fast at hand-coding that I just don't feel a need to have a live preview taking up screen real-estate.

Dreamweaver is a much more designer centric tool, IMHO (and yes, I've used older versions of it, even helped teach a course using Dreamweaver, and later Contribute). This is cool, but my observations and experiences point to the idea that graphic designers usually make lousy programmers and coders, while programmers usually make lousy designers. It is for that reason that I'm seeing these sorts of skill sets being paired together more and more. I've looked at several jobs on monster.com, and know that is how work is done where I work.

If the programmer is handling the coding and getting the graphic design from the art director, there is a good chance that their needs and workflow would be similar to mine.

Is my logic flawed?

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Visnaut 

Come now, the same argument could be made for the entire Mac platform.

I find Dreamweaver to be bloatware, and generally a hinderance. Its preview is useless, especially if you're working on cross-browser/platform compatible sites, which end up looking like ass in its own preview window after a while.

Its code editor is generally pretty nice, but I prefer nimble apps that focus on their purpose.

Agreed... I'm not a big fan of monolithic swiss army-knife type apps either.

What text editor are you using these days? I'm on Textmate, but there are a few things I wish I could change about it.

[Aron Peterson]

Originally Posted by Madrag 

I disagree. I believe DW is now even more of a WYSIWYG editor than a text editor...

Launch Dreamweaver. What do you see first?

Templates. Templates for starter pages and blank documents covering HTML, PHP, ASP Javascript, ASP VBScript, ASP.NET C#, ASP.NET VB, Coldfusion, Coldfusion Components JSP, XSLT, Action Script, and XML.

Nearly all of them require hands on coding skills almost all the time.

Now look at your tool palets. At the top you see Spry/Ajax and Data. These require heavy coding knowledge and Dreamweaver makes developing code here so easy that the software pays for itself within a week of serious work because of the time saved.

Now look at the right pane. Bess harps on about databases and CMS. What do you see? Database tools, server binding, server behavior, and components.

Now open the Reference window. What do you see?

-Adobe Coldfusion Function Reference.
-Adobe CFML Reference.
-O'Reilly ASP.NET Reference.
-O'Reilly ASP Reference.
-O'Reilly CSS Reference.
-O'Reilly HTML Reference.
-O'Reilly Javascript Reference.
-O'Reilly JSP Reference.
-O'Reilly PHP Reference.
-O'Reilly SQL Reference.
-O'Reilly XML Reference.
-O'Reilly XSLT Reference.

That is a lot of coding reference books for what you call a WYSIWYG tool!!!

Built in SFTP and MySQL management is another thing you don't get in a text editor or worthless WYSIWYG tool.

And it doesn't end there. In code view you can paste directly from Photoshop and see your <img> tag code updated and any other pages of your site will auto update. Massive time saver. Sorry, I meant another massive time saver.

There's nothing that comes close to the time savers Dreamweaver offers and I've only mentioned a little of what it does that has made it the industry standard.

There is one really great WYSIWYG feature of Dreamweaver many designers can't live without. The ability to make a comp in any image editor, or scanned in, and use it as a tracing image in Dreamweaver. You can start coding and see your coded design appear visually over the tracing image using the split pane. Too bloody valuable.

[Madrag]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

(...) This is cool, but my observations and experiences point to the idea that graphic designers usually make lousy programmers and coders, while programmers usually make lousy designers.(...)

I agree, and fortunately that's one reason I have work, because I am a designer, but focused on the programming part as well, and I am good at it, while many designers aren't and don't have any notions of the web design and its limitations. That's the reason I get work, because once you find someone that can "talk" the creative language and also the technical language, they keep you

If the programmer is handling the coding and getting the graphic design from the art director, there is a good chance that their needs and workflow would be similar to mine.

I've also specialized in doing that.
I receive the layouts in photoshop, and I have to translate them into code. Because most design agencies do very bad html (just photoshop/image ready slices; poor code that doens't work in IE and other browsers, etc), I receive a lot of those projects and am proud to say that I can produce the html with a high degree of fidelity to the original design while using good code and CSS, etc.
My tool is DW, and it does have a bad preview, but when you deal with several elements/nested divs, etc, it's coold to know where you are at...

(I don't mean to sound like a poser, this is just to explain my point)

[besson3c]

How does the server binding work? Is that for ODBC based database/table editing, or is that something used to make the live preview work?

If your database server is setup to accept DB connections from your IP, will DW redirect DB connections from localhost to the DB server?


Just wondering how this part of it works...

As far as the rest of your post is concerned, it sounds like DW does what Flash does and offers behaviors and cookie cutter examples to use. This is cool, it just doesn't do a whole lot for me personally because I generally don't work by hacking up code examples, I try to generate my own code. With enough experience, most programmers I know have their own libraries and code that they recycle.

Perhaps mileage varies though...

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Madrag 

I agree, and fortunately that's one reason I have work, because I am a designer, but focused on the programming part as well, and I am good at it, while many designers aren't and don't have any notions of the web design and its limitations. That's the reason I get work, because once you find someone that can "talk" the creative language and also the technical language, they keep you


I've also specialized in doing that.
I receive the layouts in photoshop, and I have to translate them into code. Because most design agencies do very bad html (just photoshop/image ready slices; poor code that doens't work in IE and other browsers, etc), I receive a lot of those projects and am proud to say that I can produce the html with a high degree of fidelity to the original design.
My tool is DW, and it does have a bad preview, but when you deal with several elements/nested divs, etc, it's coold to know where you are at...

(I don't mean to sound like a poser, this is just to explain my point)

Cool, it's great to hear how others work and how they are setup!

Have you ever checked out the Firefox Web Developer extension? I find it's invaluable for checking out where div blocks begin and end, and also to look at the source generated by an Ajax call.

[Aron Peterson]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

How does the server binding work? Is that for ODBC based database/table editing, or is that something used to make the live preview work?

If your database server is setup to accept DB connections from your IP, will DW redirect DB connections from localhost to the DB server? Just wondering how this part of it works...

As far as the rest of your post is concerned, it sounds like DW does what Flash does and offers behaviors and cookie cutter examples to use.

It doesn't provide cookie cutter examples to use. I can't believe you're serious about coding and development and you have all these questions, after how many years? Seriously, I'm blushing on your behalf. It's like some designer who says he is very experienced came up to me and asked what purpose do Photoshop's layers have. It's industry standard software. Is it that hard to learn about something so well known instead of having random assumptions about it that aren't true?

[Madrag]

@Aron Peterson:
I think it all depends on the way you work/what you need to do in DW.
I've been using DW since the beta and I find it very good.

Now this should be covered in a diferent thread...

What I would like to know is where the Coda should be positioned...
Is it a text editor on steroids that does FTP?
IMHO it doesn' compete with DW, does it?

[Madrag]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Have you ever checked out the Firefox Web Developer extension? I find it's invaluable for checking out where div blocks begin and end, and also to look at the source generated by an Ajax call.

I've got it, it's the only extension that I leave "visible" on the toolbar, I love it!

[Madrag]

BTW I don't rely that much on the WYSIWYG in any of these web apps...

I always test it on Safari, FF and IE 6, it needs to work on all, and once it does, it's done (as many of you know, it already works on Safari and FF and most of the times doesn't work in IE, so the great part of my time is spent solving/getting solutions so it works in IE, because unfortunately it's the target browser ;(

The WYSIWYG is mostly to help me go faster/find/check what I'm doing...

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

It doesn't provide cookie cutter examples to use. I can't believe you're serious about coding and development and you have all these questions, after how many years? Seriously, I'm blushing on your behalf. It's like some designer who says he is very experienced came up to me and asked what purpose do Photoshop's layers have. It's industry standard software. Is it that hard to learn about something so well known instead of having random assumptions about it that aren't true?

Whatever dude, cookie cutter examples, cookie cutter code based on variables you provide, it's all the same to me. Just like you claim to keep on re-evaluating Linux and deciding that it is not for you, I've decided that Dreamweaver is not for me, and I get by just fine without it. If Dreamweaver was really such a dominant standard, you'd think that products like BBEdit, TextWrangler, Textmate, Coda, Nvu, and all the others wouldn't exist, huh?

It's just a tool, Aron.

[brokenjago]

Unfortunately, this discussion is not about the relative merits of Dreamweaver and why besson3c, or anyone else, is an idiot for not using it or something.

It's about Coda.

Back on topic please!

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Madrag 

BTW I don't rely that much on the WYSIWYG in any of these web apps...

I always test it on Safari, FF and IE 6, it needs to work on all, and once it does, it's done (as many of you know, it already works on Safari and FF and most of the times doesn't work in IE, so the great part of my time is spent solving/getting solutions so it works in IE, because unfortunately it's the target browser ;(

The WYSIWYG is mostly to help me go faster/find/check what I'm doing...

Sure... it can be frustrating dealing with knowing where div blocks and curly brackets start and end and such. I can understand finding some value out of a quick and dirty preview.

It sounds like we work in similar ways. Most of my designs are mine, I'm just finding that my goals will probably be realized a little more expediently if I focus on my programming and leave the design to somebody else. Besides, I've never been the kind of designer to come up with drop-dead gorgeous stuff anyway...

[Madrag]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Sure... it can be frustrating dealing with knowing where div blocks and curly brackets start and end and such. I can understand finding some value out of a quick and dirty preview.

This is one of the things that I didn't like in Coda (NOTE: I haven't tried it that much, I may be wrong).
You can select the elements when in the preview, and it tells you where you are, but not the opposite, neither does it highlight the code and dreamweaver does...
Their preview seems just like another web browser...

[:dragonflypro:]

Originally Posted by Madrag 

This is one of the things that I didn't like in Coda (NOTE: I haven't tried it that much, I may be wrong).
You can select the elements when in the preview, and it tells you where you are, but not the opposite, neither does it highlight the code and dreamweaver does...
Their preview seems just like another web browser...

This is ultimately my biggest issue and probably the reason I won't buy it. The scope selectors are nice, but of little use if it doesn't 'sync' the relevant code and display.

DW is a pig, the UI is rather outdated… but it does much of the job in ways that many others can not. Block level selection and framing (divs, etc)

I almost never use it with a style sheet attached, just as slam dunk html formatting.

Try importing a 8 page word doc (submitted by a copywriter) into any text editor and get formatted HTML (strong, em, etc). DW preserves all the basic HTML and makes it terribly quick to move through and supply h1-6 or p elements where needed so your css works.

There is also little else that has as robust binary file placement dialogs except perhaps BBE.

Coda can eventually do all this, but it does not today… and may never.

It is 1/4 the cost of DW but debatably comes with 1/4 of the functionality.

I'd honestly have preferred Panic spent more on feature set and may a bit less on the candy.

Visually stunning, but a bit short on complex function.

[besson3c]

FWIW, I've been quite impressed with how the WYSIWYG toolbar in tools like WordPress, Joomla, etc. (and any others that use the TinyMCE toolbar) preserve formatting from a paste from Word.

[Aron Peterson]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Whatever dude, cookie cutter examples, cookie cutter code based on variables you provide, it's all the same to me. Just like you claim to keep on re-evaluating Linux and deciding that it is not for you, I've decided that Dreamweaver is not for me, and I get by just fine without it.

The big difference being that I've got a long history of using Linux workstations and you haven't used Dreamweaver once yet continually over and over again try to convince readers and yourself that it is a WYSIWYG app that has little to do with CMS, databases or coding. Reminds me of when you were patronising me as a Linux noob and purposelly misquoting me and pulling my leg. You do the same to Dreamweaver and every commercial app you can - you paint a false picture on purpose. Shame on you really.

[moep]

I too bought it today for 69$ after fiddling with it for a few hours.

It's very pretty and well thought out but as most of you, I'll stick with the Textmate/CSSEdit/Transmit combo until the kinks are ironed out.
For example I can't seem to access one of my server's console for example, wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that the server only accepts ssh rsa key logins.

[:dragonflypro:]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

FWIW, I've been quite impressed with how the WYSIWYG toolbar in tools like WordPress, Joomla, etc. (and any others that use the TinyMCE toolbar) preserve formatting from a paste from Word.

And I have not.

[Gee4orce]

Had a Kernel Panic today that seemed to be caused by Coda (happened when opening the app).... Hmm...

[Chuckit]

Originally Posted by Gee4orce 

Had a Kernel Panic today that seemed to be caused by Coda (happened when opening the app).... Hmm...

Interesting. Have any third-party kexts installed?

[davesimondotcom]

Aron -
Most professional web designers (myself included) do hand-code everything. Many, many, many use a combo of Transmit/TextMate/CSSEdit/Terminal/MAMP.

I have a copy of Dreamweaver. The only time I use it is if I have to edit ugly old sites that were laid out with tables and sometimes for forms.

The reality is that Dreamweaver's capabilities are lacking compared to the combo listed above.

I've been working Coda into my workflow, doing simple editing in Coda while jumping into TextMate for things that I know I can do faster with it's Bundles. Coda rocks.

[Aron Peterson]

Originally Posted by davesimondotcom 

Aron -
Most professional web designers (myself included) do hand-code everything. Many, many, many use a combo of Transmit/TextMate/CSSEdit/Terminal/MAMP.

I didn't put down any of the above. I never did that. All I did was correct purposely created misinformation about Dreamweaver.

As for popular combinations: Dreamweaver, Terminal, Photoshop, Illustrator, any decent FTP app if not using Dreamweaver (many are), CPanel and PHP MyAdmin are the most commonly used applications and interfaces (not necassarily all together). Then come the rest, otherwise the developers of Transmit, TextMate, CSSEdit etc would have made a lot more money than they have.

[Chuckit]

Originally Posted by davesimondotcom 

Aron -
Most professional web designers (myself included) do hand-code everything.

I think Aron realizes this. The point isn't that designers use WYSIWYG, but that Dreamweaver is a capable code editor and even provides basic capabilities for working with databases.

Granted, I use TextMate for text editing (I stopped using Dreamweaver mainly because it really wants to do its own file management and SUCKS at it), but some still do.

[Silky Voice of The Gorn]

For me, Coda is about 90% where it needs to be in terms of text editing capabilities in comparison to Textmate. Which is pretty damn impressive for a 1.0. I can't wait to see what the next few revisions bring.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

The big difference being that I've got a long history of using Linux workstations and you haven't used Dreamweaver once yet continually over and over again try to convince readers and yourself that it is a WYSIWYG app that has little to do with CMS, databases or coding. Reminds me of when you were patronising me as a Linux noob and purposelly misquoting me and pulling my leg. You do the same to Dreamweaver and every commercial app you can - you paint a false picture on purpose. Shame on you really.

Let's just drop this. I was not intentionally trying to misunderstand you. Besides, I believe we've all said what we've wanted to say here...

[besson3c]

When you guys say "FTP app", are you literally using FTP, or are you lumping SFTP into the "FTP app" label?

[:dragonflypro:]

Originally Posted by davesimondotcom 

Aron -
Most professional web designers (myself included) do hand-code everything. Many, many, many use a combo of Transmit/TextMate/CSSEdit/Terminal/MAMP.

While many may hand-code, the notion of 'most' is purely anecdotal.

Originally Posted by davesimondotcom 

I have a copy of Dreamweaver. The only time I use it is if I have to edit ugly old sites that were laid out with tables and sometimes for forms.

The reality is that Dreamweaver's capabilities are lacking compared to the combo listed above.

Apps are not a way of life, but tools. You use DW for some things, I use it for others (despite my pref for TM/CSSE/Tmt/Term) because that is what it is good at. And, there are many things it can do that I've yet to see paralleled by another app. And there are things I hate about it, starting with the next to useless design view.

Originally Posted by davesimondotcom 

I've been working Coda into my workflow, doing simple editing in Coda while jumping into TextMate for things that I know I can do faster with it's Bundles. Coda rocks.

Now, not to dismiss your affection for Coda, but… 'integrating into your workflow' after it has been out 24 hours comes off as a bit fanboy-ish.

Coda is cool, no doubt. I doubt it will have web developers throwing themselves off of rooftops in sheer bliss.

[besson3c]

For those of you that only use DW occassionally, do you shell out for upgrades, or just use an older version that you've hung on to?

[brokenjago]

I shell out upgrades only if it has a feature I need.

Universal Binary-ness, for instance.

[davesimondotcom]

Originally Posted by :dragonflypro: 

Now, not to dismiss your affection for Coda, but… 'integrating into your workflow' after it has been out 24 hours comes off as a bit fanboy-ish.

Coda is cool, no doubt. I doubt it will have web developers throwing themselves off of rooftops in sheer bliss.

Not fanboy-ish at all. My initial reaction was disappointment because it's text editor didn't hold a candle to TextMate (or I just haven't learned it yet.)

However, today, I USED it to do some edits on sites and found that a split view of code/preview + editing some text in TextMate really worked. And the ability to mark files for publishing and such was great.

It truly could replace Transmit in the workflow. And if the text editor gets better, it could replace most everything I use.

I am always looking for ways to be more efficient, and this is looking like one of them. Anything that helps me keep track of things better while updating any of the many sites we are in charge of is a good thing.

[Aron Peterson]

There is something fanboyish by saying that you use Dreamweaver occasionally and have already integrated Coda into your work flow when Coda has a lot of work to do before it can catch up with Dreamweaver. Selecting tags and changing fonts is far behind.

It would also be nice to be able to see code view, css and a preview all at the same time but the interface takes up too much space and needs a very high resolution monitor to be able to do so. The single window philosophy here makes working with Coda very claustophobic. I don't want a reference guide or css panel taking up so much space that I can't see a document in full.


Auto-completion of tags is way behind Dreamweaver too. I turned it off when I saw that Coda closes a div immediately after I create one, when I really wanted to close the div many lines down after some Lorem Ipsum.

It's still a very useful app but a little toyish. Not iWeb toyish of course, but it hasn't got the features and usability of an IDE for web development. When it does it will seriously give Dreamweaver trouble. Adobe will have to do some price chopping.

[:dragonflypro:]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

For those of you that only use DW occassionally, do you shell out for upgrades, or just use an older version that you've hung on to?

My 'shelling' comes in the form of a CS 3 update that gets me PS, IL, DW, FW, Acrobat and Flash for 499, so the 'retail' comparison is not one I could do.

I've no idea if DW CS3 will be a huge step forward, but when part of the package, it's not a big deal. FW is my one true love of what was Studio 8. Very interested to see how it integrates with PS. Before, PS was just horrible for web style/precision vectors.

All that said, if it was only it's .doc pasting (including track changes support), quick and easy doc formatting and good site level F/R tools it'd still be worth it.

[davesimondotcom]

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

There is something fanboyish by saying that you use Dreamweaver occasionally and have already integrated Coda into your work flow when Coda has a lot of work to do before it can catch up with Dreamweaver. Selecting tags and changing fonts is far behind.

Changing fonts? You mean by going to Preferences > Editor > then clicking on "Editor Font"? I've already mentioned that I'll use TextMate for text editing more times than not. And TextMate's abilities kick DW's butt. Big time.

Or do you mean in HTML documents? Because I do that in CSS, which is MUCH easier in CSSEdit. DW sucks for CSS, IMHO.

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

It would also be nice to be able to see code view, css and a preview all at the same time but the interface takes up too much space and needs a very high resolution monitor to be able to do so. The single window philosophy here makes working with Coda very claustophobic. I don't want a reference guide or css panel taking up so much space that I can't see a document in full.

Valid point, but at the same time, the interface for DW is a total mess. I was working most of the day in Coda today with a split view of HTML source and Preview. Worked great.

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

Auto-completion of tags is way behind Dreamweaver too. I turned it off when I saw that Coda closes a div immediately after I create one, when I really wanted to close the div many lines down after some Lorem Ipsum.

Again, TextMate. DW is WAY behind on that kind of thing.

Besides, why not just type <div> then lorem then hit tab. Poof. Works pretty well, I think.

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

It's still a very useful app but a little toyish. Not iWeb toyish of course, but it hasn't got the features and usability of an IDE for web development. When it does it will seriously give Dreamweaver trouble. Adobe will have to do some price chopping.

It's not really meant to compete with DW. And if you think it does, take a marketing course.

DW is, for the most part, an aging monster that some people continue to cling to because they are dinosaurs who haven't bothered to learn Web Standards.

I do like how you call me a fanboy while orally copulating Dreamweaver... it's funny.

[besson3c]

Does Coda do automatic code indentation? I appreciate this feature in Textmate, it makes determining where conditional structures begin and end at a glance much easier...

[davesimondotcom]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

For those of you that only use DW occassionally, do you shell out for upgrades, or just use an older version that you've hung on to?

Old version here. But, like I said, I only use it when fiddling with old table-based layouts or putting together complex forms.

[Aron Peterson]

[QUOTE]

Originally Posted by davesimondotcom 

Or do you mean in HTML documents? Because I do that in CSS, which is MUCH easier in CSSEdit. DW sucks for CSS, IMHO.

If you say app x sucks for CSS you have to say how and why otherwise it means nothing. The sky is yellow today. Prove it.

Valid point, but at the same time, the interface for DW is a total mess.

It could do with the new CS3 interface, and will have it, but otherwise it does its job better than most because the tools you need are easily available and plain to see. If its panels are a mess so is Photoshop and Flash's.

I was working most of the day in Coda today with a split view of HTML source and Preview. Worked great.

And exactly how big is you monitor? At 1280x1024 Coda is still claustrophobic. At 1024x768 it is near useless. Now try opening a reference manual while trying to edit a stylesheet and PHP/HTML.

It's not really meant to compete with DW.

No reason why it shouldn't try.

DW is, for the most part, an aging monster that some people continue to cling to because they are dinosaurs who haven't bothered to learn Web Standards.

Pretty stupid thing to say considering DW has kept up with web standards all along. Thanks for calling the majority of the world's successful web designers dinosaurs. You are so avante guarde

I do like how you call me a fanboy while orally copulating Dreamweaver... it's funny.

No. I was being sensible. If you are going to say something like 'X App is better than Y app" you should back it up with an example otherwise it's as meaningless as discussing employment prospects for the developing world with a 5 year old.

[besson3c]

I still want to know why you feel that 90% of the world's web developers use DW. What do you base this on?

What percentage of these users are Windows developers?

[brokenjago]

If anything, from what I've read, Aron here is a total Dreamweaver fanboi.

[davesimondotcom]

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

If you say app x sucks for CSS you have to say how and why otherwise it means nothing. The sky is yellow today. Prove it.

Dreamweaver, in my experience, puts CSS in a second-rate position. Use CSSEdit for half a day, then tell me that I'm not right about DW sucking with CSS.

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

It could do with the new CS3 interface, and will have it, but otherwise it does its job better than most because the tools you need are easily available and plain to see. If its panels are a mess so is Photoshop and Flash's.

Well, considering I haven't paid for CS3 yet, my experience is limited to DW 8. And it's got WAY too many palettes and forces me to work the way it does, rather than letting me work the way I want to.

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

And exactly how big is you monitor? At 1280x1024 Coda is still claustrophobic. At 1024x768 it is near useless. Now try opening a reference manual while trying to edit a stylesheet and PHP/HTML.

Um, each one you can open in a new tab. So I don't see what the problem is. And my PowerBook is 1280. My monitor at work is a 23" ACD. So real estate isn't a problem. And I doubt it is for most designers.

Look at it this way - how much is a license for DW? How much is Coda? The difference is enough to buy a pretty nice monitor.

Besides, it isn't like DW has a compact interface!

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

No reason why it shouldn't try.

DW, anymore, is for graphic designers who want to do some web work. People who make their living coding sites hand-code.

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

Pretty stupid thing to say considering DW has kept up with web standards all along. Thanks for calling the majority of the world's successful web designers dinosaurs. You are so avante guarde

Well, considering I've been making a living doing web design for the better part of a decade, I'd say I'm a "successful web designer." And I do use DW. But I find the tools available in Coda/Transmit/TextMate/CSSEdit/Terminal a lot more freeing and powerful.[/QUOTE]

Originally Posted by Aron Peterson 

No. I was being sensible. If you are going to say something like 'X App is better than Y app" you should back it up with an example otherwise it's as meaningless as discussing employment prospects for the developing world with a 5 year old.

OK, here's a concrete example of how TextMate rocks and DW sucks:

Make an unordered list out of this counting your mouse clicks and/or keystrokes:

One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten

In TextMate, it took me four keystrokes. [Command-A (select all), Control-Shift-Command-W (wrap each line in a tag, by default, an <li>), Command-A, Control-Shift-W (wrap selection in tag, by default, a <ul>).

Now, say you decided to make that list a list of links. In Dreamweaver, you have to select each piece of text and make it a link. In TextMate, simply use a combination of multi-line selection, and "edit each line in selection."

This is all without creating a single Bundle. Once you do that, it's even more powerful.

Do I really have to give a specific example of how CSSEdit beats DW? Because I can.

I just think it's funny that I was called a fanboy by a guy whose sig is made up of Adobe CS3 icon imitations.