Customer Reviews

Dynamic Learning Dreamweaver CS3

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

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This book has a lot going for it as a classroom tool. The 13 lessons deal with the basics of using Dreamweaver, customizing it to the way you work, and touches on broad Web coding issues. So beginners, who most need those broader issues as context, will appreciate that something extra they need.

The author does not go into much detail on any subject. Two of those "broad issues" I mentioned before were Cascading Style Sheets and using tables for layout. The book shows the importance of CSS to good design and introduced me to some CSS conveniences in Dreamweaver CS3 I was not aware of. One odd thing: the author warns against using tables for page layout (correct!) but then titles a chapter and video session "Creating Page Layouts with Tables." Yet, the content of the chapter had very little to do with using tables for layout. It stuck closely to some of Dreamweaver's best facilities for handling *data* tables, like the CSV import feature. Lousy title, good content.

The book itself is done up in full color with illustrations tracking each lesson well. I sometimes felt the included videos were a bit padded and neither as valuable or as clear as the text. However, the detailed "zoom ins" were a nice touch and helped a lot. Since many of the screens in the video were chock full of objects, I had trouble following the author's actions in the clutter. It would have been better if his mouse cursor had been larger or a bright color to make that part easier.
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I never take the time to write a book review but maybe I'll save you the money and especially the time. I bought this over other books for the instructional DVD included. The very first instruction in Lesson One on the DVD tells you to open "index.html". There is no "index.html" in Lesson One on the DVD. So, I read the beginning of Chapter One for Lesson One and it says to open "SpryWidgets.html". The instructions on the DVD and the book are worlds apart! Upon opening the "SpryWidgets.html" it does not have the text needed to follow the instructions on the DVD. I spent over three hours trying to interpet the two different sets of instructions. The book is very poorly written with no attention to detail. Now I have to drive back to Borders in the morning on my $3.50 per gallon gas to get my money back. I wasted over half a Saturday on this turkey!

Not fully understanding what I was getting into I offered to support a web site for a non profit organization that did not have the funds to pay for the service. Using this book as a textbook, I was quickly able to get up to speed and bring their web sit up to date. I have since been asked to develop a web site for a possible new business.

The book takes a step by step approach with each step explained. Possible errors or points of confusion are anticipated and clarified. Each lesson has well developed examples that can also serve as models for your web site. The book is in color so the book pictures match the screen displays. I scanned over the first chapter of what was new because it was all new to me. I followed the other lessons as one would a textbook using what was appropriate for my own site. I never encountered a step that wasn't possible and when finished with the lesson their examples were good templates for what I was doing.

This book does not cover the server side of the coding and I have started using another source to learn how to use PHP with Dreamweaver. However, I still refer to this book for ideas and found it to be an incredible frustration free way to learn how to create and update web sites.

As someone who is relatively new to Adobe CS3, I found this book easy to use and a great help. Happy to recommend it to anyone who wants to learn Dreamweaver CS3.

I have to agree with "Wasted Saturday" with regards to this book/DVD. From the very start the Lesson 01 video does not match the lesson content included with the DVD. One would assume that when you begin viewing the very first lesson, the instructions on the video would be easy to follow and the content the instructor asks you to utilize would be easy to find. Not so. Mere seconds into the first lesson you are asked to find and open the "index.html" file in the lesson folder on the DVD. The file does not exist! Great start! Yes, there is good information in the book but if you are an audio/visual learner like me (the only reason I bought this product was because of the DVD tutorials) you will find it severely lacking. I'm not sure what product the reviewers who gave this a 4 and 5-star rating were using, but it sure doesn't warrant that high a rating IMHO. The video tutorials at Lynda are far better (albeit more expensive) and much more in-depth. I wouldn't recommend anyone wasting their money on this book/DVD package.

The Dynamic Learning series of books is to learning software what the old Dick & Jane series was to learning to read. With Dynamic Learning: Dreamweaver CS3, author Fred Gerantabee presents us with an intro to learning the software on the same level as the owners manuals found in the glove compartments of new cars. The new car manuals introduce us to the vehicle's various systems and show us how to work the knobs and levers, but are not intended to go beyond basic maintenance and familiarity. As the literary world of software manuals would say, "that is beyond the scope of this book."

Website creation is not for the faint of heart and in an era when companies like Adobe are on an eighteen-month turnaround schedule to get the next new and improved version of their software out to the market, it's intellectually difficult (for me, at least) to keep up with all the newest techniques supposedly intended to make our work easier. Indeed, more to learn and absorb makes remembering it all that much harder for my aging brain.

That said, Fred does a terrific job of presenting clear and concise introductions to the myriad of possibilities presented by Dreamweaver CS3. The book comes with an accompanying DVD of lesson files to work on while you follow along with Fred's instructions. The book tantalizes you with all of the possibilities incorporated into many of Dreamweaver's more prominent features.

Fred covers basic layouts, table layouts, frame layouts, CSS layouts, applying CSS style sheets, adding Spry widgets for navigation, tag structures, adding video & sound, working with Snippets, modifying templates... and the list goes on down to how to use Dreamweaver's built-in code and error checking report tools. In short, he covers everything in an easy-to-follow, easy-to-understand way.

As with all of the books in the Dynamic Learning series, this one comes with an email address to use when you spot what you think is an error in the book. When my results did not match what Fred's tutorial indicated I should be seeing, I fired off a question to the email address provided and had a response from Jennifer Smith of the AGI Creative Team in less than twenty-four hours. Soon after that initial email, I found myself corresponding directly with Fred himself while we hashed out a browser display issue that ultimately proved to be on my end. If only all book publishers were this responsive to the consumer!

If there's a downside to the book, it's its new-car-owner's-manual-in-the-glove-compartment approach that introduces you to all the bells and whistles but will never turn you into a mechanic. That, as they say, is beyond the scope of this book.

This is a good book for beginners trying to get started with Dreamweaver CS3. I teach DW courses and have used this and the Lynda.com HOTS book both with success, but this book gives a more logical progression through the material. I notice the 1-star reviews both mention frustration with the missing/misnamed files on the disk - be sure to download the missing files from the O'Reilly web site. (examples.[...])

Files are missing on the dvd which comes with this book, making it very difficult to learn from it.
Take my advise not to buy this book

While not part of the Missing Manual series, the book provides the reader with a step-by-step set of instructions on how to use Dreamweaver CS3. It is aimed at new users of Dreamweaver CS3, but will be of use to more advanced users as well because it covers the upgrades to and changes from the last version.

The book begins with clear and succinct instructions on how to use the video tutorials as well as the lesson files and sets forth the requirements for both Windows and MAC users. The first lesson jumps right into Spry and discussions of integration with various other Adobe products along with an explanation of how web sites work, domains, servers and web hosts, the role of web browsers and an introduction to HTML. The order of the topics is a little weird with the discussion of Spry and Adobe Bridge before the basics of web sites and html. That having been said, it's still a good introduction for the beginner.

Other lessons include creating a web site from scratch with Dreamweaver. There are lots of illustrations and each is accompanied by a clear explanation of each topic discussed. For those interested in adding Flash, videos and sound to pages, there is a chapter devoted to how to do it. It does not show you how to create the Flash content, but Dreamweaver does include functionality to create some Flash content such as buttons and text. Another lesson is on building web forms and at least mentions ways to connect the form data to a database. The scope of the book doesn't permit detailed coverage of the topic, but does include the addition of some behaviors to the form, such as validation. Dreamweaver has a number of built-in javascripts to do validations that are easy to add.

Chapters are followed by a number of assignments for studying to reinforce what has been discussed. There is a set of review questions complete with answers.

One of the best features of the book is that as the lessons progress, there is a great emphasis on the use of CSS to style the pages and it includes discussions of the differences between print and the web when choosing font sizes, how to prepare images for use on the web. Several chapters are devoted to page layout, both with tables (for data mostly) and with CSS.

The first part of the book teaches using the design view in Dreamweaver--the reader doesn't have to deal directly with the HTML, but it does include a lesson on editing in the code view as well.

The final chapter discussions maintenance of the web site, including reports and optimization.

'Dynamic Learning Dreamweaver CS3' is a fantastic guide for all those developers who are looking to learn and ramp up on Dreamweaver CS3 asap. Jam-packed with 400+ pages of material with a DVD inside, this wonderful book isn't just pages but full interactive content included!! Chapters are called Lessons in this book and there are 13 here. The transitions from one lesson to the next are smooth and clear with not just great layout (so easy on the eyes) but nice writing as well!!

If you are a new user or want to see what the newest version of Dreamweaver has to offer you will be hard-pressed to not be happy with this book. It's a welcome addition to your web library and a sure fire hit!!

***** HIGHLY RECOMMENDED