Will Expression be Dreamweaver’s Nightmare?
Microsoft will be releasing their latest attempt to take over some market share from Adobe’s Dreamweaver. This release will first be going to developers as a Community Technology Preview (CTP). I’m not a part of that group, so I won’t be able to give you any hands-on feedback of the tool.
What I can say though is that I’ve been a Dreamweaver user since DW2, and have recently installed and beein using Dreamweaver 8. I attempted to download and install Visual Studio 2005 Web Developer, as I was beginning to do more development with ASP and thought that would be the best tool to begin using. I also had a friend that was using VS2003, and figured that would give me a good support network. Regretfully, my experience (along with many others) was less than pleasant and I have since uninstalled VS2005 and relied completely on Dreamweaver 8.
I should also say that I wasn’t too happy when Adobe purchased Macromedia, as I was afraid of the culture differences between the two companies. I always felt that Macromedia was very in tune and aware of their user base, and I just have not got that same feeling with Adobe. So, part of me is very open now to another tool if it works. I’m very interested in trying out this tool to compare.
Wayne Smith, product manager for Expression Web Designer at Microsoft, said that the only tool comparable to Expression Web Designer for Web designers right now is Adobe Dreamweaver. But he highlighted Web Designer’s support for ASP.Net 2.0, the latest version of Microsoft’s technology for building Web-based applications and services, as a differentiator between the tools.
“[Dreamweaver] supports ASP.Net version 1.1, but only to a fairly superficial level,” he said. “We have deep support.”
Smith also stressed Microsoft’s effort to support standards such as Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) in Web Designer. CSS is the standard technology Web designers use to create modern Web-site layout. Microsoft enables Web designers not only to build pages using CSS but also manage the underlying code, which can be a hassle for developers, Smith said.
Granted if anyone should be able to develop a tool that handles ASP.NET 2.0, then it should definitely be the parent company of the language wouldn’t you think? I also know that there’s been no other tool that I have experience with that has taught and equipped me more than Dreamweaver with relation to CSS.
We’ll see how it goes.
Source: Microsoft Readies Dreamweaver Rival
Tags: Adobe, ASP.NET-2.0, CSS, Dreamweaver, Expression, HTML, MacromediaRelated Stories
POSTED IN: Business Users, New Products, Speculation, Visual Studio
2 opinions for Will Expression be Dreamweaver’s Nightmare?
Steve Ashworth
Sep 15, 2006 at 12:44 pm
Great article,
Im a graphic designer who is finding it difficult if im honest to transfer my print design skills into web design.
I find dreamweaver to be a frustrating program and welcome any competition. I mean Dreamweaver really is like using square pegs to fill round holes.. its absurd.
Why cant we have tables to hold content with round corners with a click of a button?
Why cant we do what we want with our background images and perhaps move them around as you would an image in photoshop?
I consider myself a master of photoshop but I feel like a novice sometimes in dreamweaver. It really is frustrating and gets to me sometimes.
Web design should be a lot easier in this day and age it really should. I think adobe and macromedia should be ashamed of dreamweaver.
Is their any news on the new microsoft program yet?
stephane
Feb 17, 2007 at 11:42 pm
Agreed Steve. I also have over eight years of blood sweat and tears (of joy) with Photoshop and for the life of me I cannot believe how unfriendly Dreamweaver 8 is to graphic designers or beginners to web design. I’ve toyed around with it for over three months and I am seriously considering an alternative (i.e. “better” program).
One thing that really bugs me as well is not being able to freely move objects around. I mean, that is the singlemost fundamental action we should be able to take in web design - yet nothing except for layers seems to support it.
I hope I don’t reach eighty years of age when someone finally creates a web design program your average ten year old can use
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