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As
Edison Junior High's webmaster, I have always used FrontPage,
to create and maintain our school's website. This summer, our
district decided that all school webmaster should use a similar
HTML editor when creating and maintaining their school's website.
This would make troubleshooting easier and would allow each
school homepage to have similar format. In doing so, our district
decided to use Macromedia Dreamweaver 4.0 as the HTML software
editor. There are many reasons why they chose this software...
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Dreamweaver
has many wonderful feature that allows an average person to
create a professional and eye appealing web page with little
training. It offers many different functions and tools that
other editing program leave out and make steps/directions
easy enough to follow that you really don't have to read a
book to create a page. Basically the organization is similar
to any other window software and has similar features that
you would find in program such as Microsoft Word or PowerPoint
This makes it easy to use. I am very impress with the organization
and the tool bars. Here are features that I found to be helpful.
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Working
tool bar which has ALL the feature you need while working
in an area of the webpage. For example, it allows you to change
your font, create targets or links, change background, insert
table or frames, and to add wraps around pictures. Here is
what the tool bar looks like.
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Another
feature that I find to be very helpful is that the editor allows
you to view the HTML code that the program is writing for you.
This allows you to make changes that would be easier for you
to do in code or is not offered by the program. I have used
this function once or twice to make changes that I could not
figure how to do with the program. Of course, the more I use
Dreamweaver, the more function/features I find out how to use.
Sometimes though, it is easier to just look at the code and
make the changes needed without trying to figure out where you
went wrong with the editing software.
- The object
pallette is another helpful feature. It allows the designer to
edit images that you insert into your page by adding functions
that make the image look professional. The tool bar, once again,
has similiar function to those you would found in Microsoft Word
or PowerPoint, therefore, making it very easy to use. One other
feature I like, is that it offer the designer the option to create
image maps.
- Dreamweaver
also has other features that make the program exceptional. It
allows you to create photo albums (thumbnails), edit images, and
add other things like flashes to images with a built in program
called Fireworks. This program is also very easy to use. Basically,
this program allows the designer to enhance his/her images.
- Overall,
Dreamweaver is a very good program. Though I am not an expert
with it yet, I do find that I know how to workmore features with
this program in the small amount of time that I have used it,
than I knew how to do with frontpage in the whole year that I
used it. For example, F7 is spell check or that F12 allows you
to preview your page as it would look on the Internet (without
frames or tables line on it). The program is truly set up for
the most elementary webmaster out there. It seem like everyday
I learn something new and I like the program more and more.
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- I found
the challenges to be few and far between with Dreamweaver. Many
of the challenges are very basic and minor. One problem that constantly
occured is where pictures and images default to. For example,
when making a bullet list, sometimes the bullet doesn't allow
you to add a space in between. I left thelast two bullets on the
feature list to show exactly what I am writing about. On the first
bullet you can see a space in between the image and the second
bullet. For the other two bullets, you can see that there is no
space due to where the program's default has set the format for
the bullet. Another challenge was that Fireworks does not have
as many editing options for images as Adobe Photoshop Elements
does. Fireworks is good to use for some photo editing purposes
but overall I still use Adobe Photoshop Elements more. Beside
those two challenges, I find that Dreamweaver is a much more user-friendly
program than the other two HTML editing softwares that I have
used in the past. I am very glad that our district chose to use
it and I am looking foward to learning to more about Dreamweaver's
capabilities.
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- This list
links to my fellow CTER student's reviews of different HTML editing
software webpages. This project is part of an assignment for Edpsy
490 NET offered through the University of Illinois, Champaign.
(Master's Degree Program)
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- Click
on the Books to Order (Good Tutorials for Dreamweaver)
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