Some upgrades are rip-offs, some are bug-ridden, some are too minor to worry about, but some are usually must-haves. Dreamweaver upgrades tend to fall into this last category.
Since Dreamweaver Is a web development tool, new features tend to reflect changes in the web technology, such as the growing importance of CSS. It’s not usually just a case of introducing a few snazzy new tools for the sake of it.
Dreamweaver is now part of Adobe’s Creative Suites, so part of the upgrade will simply be cosmetic, but what else have Adobe come up with in their first upgrade of this industry-standard web development tool.
Dreamweaver CS3 has useful new features for transferring CSS code from one location to another. You can move an internal CSS definition from inside an individual page to an external style sheet. It is also possible to take inline CSS (located next to the item it described) and transfer to an external style sheet.
Dreamweaver CS3’s browser compatibility check allows developers to target specific versions of all the major browsers (Firefox, Internet Explorer, Netscape, Opera, Safari) and generate a report detailing CSS-related issues with elements on the current page.
The last time Dreamweaver was upgraded, Photoshop was a rival to Macromedia’s own Fireworks. Now that Dreamweaver and Photoshop are part of the same stable, Adobe has enhanced their compatibility. You can now copy a slice, selection or entire document from Photoshop, move over to Dreamweaver and paste it. This brings up a special window which enables to optimise and save the copied pixels as a new image.
As well as enhanced support for CSS, Dreamweaver now allows the inclusion of elements of the new Ajax technology which uses JavaScript to add a new level of interactivity to web pages by updating the page with elements from a server without having to reload the page. Dreamweaver’s implementation of Ajax is via the Spry framework. This is a collection of JavaScript-based code which provides a simple way for web designers to add Ajax content to their pages without having to type a line of code.
There are three types of Spry content: widgets, special effects and data sets. Spry Widgets are clickable page elements which respond to user interaction in funky ways. For example, there is a tabbed panel widget which displays different content in the same part of the page depending on which tab the user clicks on. There are also widgets for creating navigational menus and submenus and for validating text fields, text areas and select elements on a form.
Spry effects can be applied to a wide range of HTML elements. They allow designers to have images and other page content fade, shrink, zoom etc. in response to actions carried out by the user such as moving the mouse pointer over a particular element.
Spry Data sets are JavaScript objects that display data from an XML source in an HTML table. There is also a useful drill-down capability whereby users can click on summary information displayed in rows of a table to display detailed information in another region of the page.
Dreamweaver CS3 is also the first version of the program to offer compatibility with Intel-based and PowerPC Macintosh systems. It also runs on Windows XP and Windows Vista systems.
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