Customer Reviews

Dreamweaver 4 for Windows & Macintosh (Visual QuickStart Guide)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I teach Dreamweaver for an Apple Specialist, in a two day class and they recieve a book at the end of the class. I use to use a different book, but liked the other Visual Quickstart books, so I thought I'd try this one as well.

WOW! It has EVERYTHING I wanted from a book and then some. The 602 actual pages (not including the index) was impressive. Each chapter explains everything perfectly, and of course better than the manual. It was the perfect choice for my students because it is such a great resource. Plus, once they have mastered the basics, there is enough information to take their sites to the next level. This book gives the most information I have seen on Dreamweaver 4. The chapters on CSS and Layers alone are worth the price of the book. I was also impressed on the amount of information on behaviors, automation and customizing.Best Dreamweaver book around for the beginning to intermediate user.

I'm surprised at the feedback I've seen on this book because I truly enjoy the Quickstart series of computer books. They're informative, detailed and the content is easy to find. In fact, their books were used as my textbooks in college and I liked them so much I continue to use them. But I won't say that these books aren't for a specific type of person. I will explain.

If you've ever picked up a Whatever-for-Dummies book, or the Idiot's-Guide-for-something or any kind of Textbooks-for-Morons you either like them or hate them. Why? Because they all seem to be written at the same level meaning they are real beginner books. If you are the type of person who doesn't know how to work a mouse, then I suggest that you stick to Dummy books. The Quickbooks are more geared towards people who like to play with programs to figure them out. They do give brief explanations of the basics, and I mean: "This is a pallet, this is a brush" but they only do it briefly. They are non-patronizing to the people out there who have a knack for figuring programs out.

Quickbooks are also informative. If you need information on a specific topic, such as adjusting contrast, you'll usually find it within seconds through the glossary. Not only that, but there are a number of visual aids to reference and shows step-by-step what you're going to do or use. Sometimes, they even include URLs to pages on the web.

The details are also worth their while to read. They give plenty of additional tips to use that you might not think of. It will usually be in a side box with a "did you know" kind of title. These have helped in my work plenty of times and given me ideas.

Plus, these books are for Mac or PC which is a plus for me considering sometimes I have to work on one or the other platform and don't always know the keystrokes or commands which can be quite different from each other.

Again, these are reference books. They are not tutorial books for the ultimate beginner. I continue to use these books with my work and enjoy them thoroughly. I recommend these books for people who like to play with programs and need something to look back on and research further.

I am new to dreamweaver and this book has quickly helped me become productive BUT it has a few problems.

Sometimes there are crucial steps missing from detailed step-by-step procedures and these have left me in the proverbial. For example, when explaining how to make a link appear in a popup window that does not have any controls, I followed what the book said and I got two windows popping up instead of one! It did not say I would need to open the popup window on the mousedown event.I had to figure that out for myself. Surely they could have had somebody test the examples in the book before publishing it.

Also,the book does not show you objectives and how to achieve them by tying together different parts of dreamweaver. This makes explanations of different dreameaver topics feel disjointed. For example, it discussed layers and tables seperately without much guidance on layout in general. As a beginner, I needed more guidance in what I should be aiming for with layout. I needed more than just a listing of the options available in dreamweaver.

On the other hand, a lot of stuff in this book is very good.The explanations are clear and the illustrations are great. I have learned a lot about dreamweaver but I reckon I should have bought the HOT Dreamweaver book instead.It seems to be a better guide towards the whys and wherefores of building a site with dreamweaver.

I am disappointed with this book.

Unless you are Evelyn Wood, having to read 600 pages (`visual' or not) isn't such a quick start for many. This book certainly could have been much shorter based on content value/quality.

As if 600 pages worth of a 300-page book weren't enough... Getting referred every couple of pages to a Web-site-based appendix (additional cyber appendices A through G) for basic/simple topics that should be in the book (like coverage of the image map editor) was frustrating, especially when one considers some of the redundant actual book content. The book carries a lot of baggage over from earlier editions, including incorrect discussion on a variety of topics/technology.

The book claims to _not_ be a manual re-hash, but it parrots many descriptions (almost verbatim) written by the MM documentation team. Many of the sections also seem structured/patterned after the manual.

Towers borrows noticeably from other existing sources, too. For example, her language describing style sheets and CSS style rules is almost identical to Elizabeth Castro's in the VQS HTML 4 book(s). This is more than coincidence, since both descriptions use the exact same inaccurate terms.

It just doesn't seem to me like it was edited well, technically or otherwise. And I didn't sense that the author was fundamentally grounded in many aspects of the material she presented.

Even though the VQS line is inexpensive, there are much better books/authors. I suggest spending a couple of dollars extra elsewhere.

The topics covered are very well written and easy to follow. I used it to get up to speed on DW4 and have been mostly pleased with it, but be warned that many basic DW4 concepts are not covered (how to make image maps and how to import a site that is already published on the web come immediately to mind). If Ms. Towers adds these to the next edition she will indeed have written a 5-star book.

I would suggest you supplement this title with either "Teach Yourself Visually Dreamweaver 4" or "Dreamweaver 4/Fireworks 4 Visual JumpStart" to have a more complete set of DW4 reference works on hand.

If you are trying to develop a high-end website that is easily manageable and easily updateable then dreamweaver is your best bet. Better than GoLive and Frontpage, it easily creates dHTML pages with one click. This book helps you figure out how to use some of the more complex features that come with dreamweaver, such as the timeline (which isn't hard if you've ever used flash) and other new features that are Dreamweaver 4 specific. I recommend this book to anyone who just spend a good chunk of hard cash to buy dreamweaver and simply doesn't know how to utilize dreamwaever yet.

The main reasons I purchased this book was b/c of its affordable price and good reviews. I further examined it and read its "STRAIGHTFORWARD" attributes. However, after having read some chapters, I realized that it's not so straightforward as it's advertised. Though somewhat relevant, many of the chapters' contents are random and should not have been placed there b/c it actually slows your learning curve. Yes, I think when you learn something, you should do so well. However, time is important to me, and this book can be very time consuming. I have many DW books now b/c of the confusion I had at times of reading this. It's not organized in the best way.

But by common sense - Please realize: how good can a ($$$) book possibly be. It does cover a wide range of topics, but it's not presented in the best, time saving method possible.

If you're a smart person, and don't need a lot of RANDOM comments thrown at you, I recommend DW Virtual Classroom. Though not as comprehensive as DW VQS, it will get you up and running in matter of days or 2 weeks at the latest.

And of course, you should move on to INTERMEDIATE-ADVANCED DW, in which I recommend Inside DW and DREAMWEAVER MAGIC; both by NEW RIDER. To be real good with DW, you need to learn DW EXTENSIONS, and INSIDE DW covers exactly that, as well as comprehesive reference and exercises on other DW topics.

Since this book is a bit outdated I won't write a long review, but this is a great book for anyone that is looking to learn how to use Dreamweaver 4 and get up and running to making your web site. Packed full of 600+ pages, I have always felt that the Quickstart guides are perfect books for anyone that is looking to quickly start learning a new technology, and that certainly is the case with this guide. Snappy writing, a nice layout, and all and all a great FEEL for the book (all the Quickstart guides have this feel) make this a proven winner.

**** RECOMMENDED

J. Tarin Tower's book, "Dreamweaver for Windows and Macintosh" is a good book, as far as it goes; but there is nothing (as far as I can find) about Timelines, which are important if you're going to create any kind of song and dance on your website. It has been helpful to me in the self-taught business of learning Dreamweaver. While it is very polished and well organized, with step by step instructions on how to implement the many features of the program, it is weak in terms of the big picture, how and why various sub-routines can be used to solve a design problem and achieve a particular effect. I'd say it's the best book in its field, mainly because there isn't anything else out there - yet, as far as I know.

If you want to learn Dreamweaver, this is NOT a good choice. I bought this and Lynda Weinstein's Hands-On-Training (HOT) for Dreamweaver. Weinstein's HOT book is awesome and I highly recommend it. The QuickStart Guide is purely a reference manual and you might as well use the manual that comes with Dreamweaver (it's better).