Customer Reviews

Macromedia Dreamweaver MX 2004 Demystified

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

 

 

Dreamweaver MX 2004 Demystified is an excellent resource for web developers who use DWMX 2004, but probably shouldn't be your first choice if you're looking to make full use of the tool with ColdFusion. The writing is fresh and easy to read, written in a conversational tone that makes reading and understanding topics easy. The book is chock full of useful screenshots with clear labels, showing exactly what the text is talking about. There are plenty of useful tables and illustrations, making the overall quality of the book stand out.

As a ColdFusion developer, however, the book seriously falls short. To be fair, the book isn't intended to be a Coldfusion reference, but there are some serious flaws in the chapter on integration with ColdFusion that could have been avoided if the author and technical editors actually knew ColdFusion. Rather than talk about how to write ColdFusion code, the chapter should have been written with a focus purely on integration with a ColdFusion server. Instead I felt like it tried to fill space by explaining things about ColdFusion that quite frankly were completely incorrect. I'm not as experienced with other web application models like PHP and ASP, but I also felt as if I was rereading documentation, rather than learning something new. I felt as if those chapters were book thickeners, and would have given the book 5 stars had those chapters been more useful.

I was pleased to find a chapter on integrating DWMX 2004 with version control systems - a topic that has been fresh on my mind lately as I consider using Dreamweaver MX 2004 100% of the time.

In short, the book is worth having for any serious web developer. I'm pretty confident that when I run into a problem with DWMX 2004, I'll be able to find an answer in Dreamweaver MX 2004 Demystified.

I normally use the visual quickstart guide for teaching but for unexplicable reasons, the VQS guide wasn't out when I needed to teach so I turned to demystified. I found it very easy to use and greatly appreciated the examples. I even tought myself a topic I've been meaning to learn for a couple of years. This book made it so easy, I'm not sure why I waited so long!

I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to eventually get into depth on Dreamweaver. The book is rated as "Intermediate/Advanced" level on the cover, but it's a book a novice to Dreamweaver can easily understand. The book goes well beyond just the very basics of using Dreamweaver however. For example there is a section on the coding syntax for Dreamweaver templates. Overall I found it to be very clear, well-organized and easy to follow, and enjoyable, and I am really glad I bought it.

When I first decided to teach myself web design, I began with Dreamweaver for Dummies, which only took me so far. Then I tried to work with several other Dreamweaver guides, all of which were too complex for a newbie or too disorderly and unclear. When I finally got to Macromedia Dreamweaver MX 2004 Demystified, I was relieved and elated all at once. Finally a book that made learning CSS style sheets a snap. Perhaps most importantly, it took the time to explain each element of creating a style sheet in detail while other books just gloss over them saying they are self-evident. In general, that's what makes this book great. There is no topic left uncovered.

Now that I've got the skills down, I use Gutman's book as a quick reference guide on a monthly basis.

Even though I started with Dreamweaver 2, I didn't fully understand the program until I read "Inside Dreamweaver 4." This is the MX 2004 version, and it is the best single resource I have found on Dreamweaver. I find all Macromedia Press books excellent, but this one is outstanding.

MX 2004 Demystified is that perfect book I've been wanting that takes what I already know (having taught myself and dabbled in Dreamweaver) and takes me deeper into the more sophisticated capabilities that Macromedia has come up with. But, Laura Gutman doesn't leave the beginner in the dust. She includes a standard intro chapter to explain the basics of web development and design then gently eases into more advanced topics. If you consider yourself advanced in the field, this book will also be a great asset because she explains more of Dreamweaver's functionality with dynamic pages, database interaction, etc. I would recommend this book to anyone on any level that wants to learn to use Dreamweaver as the amazing tool it is and develop high quality content rapidly.

I found I couldn't get past the enormous amount of errata in this book - had I not known the plan, I would find the directions for CSS and tables to be not only confusing, but wrong. In checking the web site to download the exercise files, I found no section for errata, which really needs to be done.

The book does have useful information about working with ColdFusion, PHP, ASP.NET and building dynamic sites; however, until we lay Netscape 4.7 to rest some day, it does have to be a big consideration in web design and this is where the book falls short - little to no mention of the pitfalls in this browser or how to work around them so that the site you design is going to hold up. I'm unhappy I spent the money on this book as it really falls short as a good reference, much less as a teaching aid.

A better choice for the money would be Garo Green with Lynda Weinman's book, Dreamweaver MX 2004 Hands-On Training.