Good Desk reference, not-so-good training manual
This book gives great tips and shortcuts and good memory joggers for those who are already experienced with Dreamweaver MX 2004. While it doesn't highlight the differences in MX and MX 2004, the reader can easily extract the new, improved stuff.
If you've never touched Dreamweaver and need more explicit training, stick with the TRAINING FROM THE SOURCE manual, DreamweaverMX 2004 by Khristine Annwn Page.
Dreamweaver MX 2004 Savvy
You will spend days/weeks absorbing the abundance of information Dreamweaver MX
2004 Savvy contains, but that's what one buys a book of this nature for.
Very good book, packed with information and guidance for one to learn Dreamweaver.
(the book includes a CD by Christian Crumlish and Lucinda Dykes).
Be prepared to spend time with this book if you are serious about learning Dreamweaver. You can read the book and complete the tutorials as you go along (recommended).
The CD that comes with Dreamweaver MX 20004 Savvy contains all the files to complete the tutorials. A bonus graphics chapter on the CD covers image optimization and slicing on Fireworks, Photoshop and Illustrator, an important chapter to help you produce a web site that is efficient. The CD also contains browsers, Internet Explorer, Netscape, Mozilla Firefox, and Opera, again necessary to test your web pages in different browsers. Demo's of Dreamweaver, Fireworks and Flash are included on CD.
A bonus chapter on PDF file and extensions and more. After you have finished reading the book and completed the tutorials, what a great book to refer to when one gets stuck, because believe me, you will get stuck.
Very good book, heavy going at times, particularly for the raw beginner, the tutorials will get the beginner up and ready in no time.
For the advanced user this book goes deeper into Dreamweaver, there are sidebars all through - out the book that gives additional and interesting detailed information.
This book is a must, heavy book to read, but it's full of good information.
Learning More about Dreamweaver
DW MX 2004 Savvy is not a quick read book. You will spend days getting all the information that it contains. And, if you really want to know everything it contains, even weeks! It is not written more like a college textbook than a true tutorial. That said there is a ton of information a web designer can learn from DW MX 2004. Fat pipes CCS (Cascading Style Sheets) in detail, expanded tables, tracing image and testing links are only a few of the subjects you will learn about when reading this book. There are even whole chapters dedicated to such things as E-Commerce Sites, hand coding and creating dynamic pages, as well as PHP and XML.A CD is included with this text and has several sections. The Bonus Chapter on the CD covers optimizing, slicing and exporting images with Fireworks, Photoshop and Illustrator. This is a nice extra but has nothing to do with the title itself. The Software section contains BNBBook - a guest book program; Contribute 2; Director MX 2004; Dreamweaver MX 2004; Fireworks MX 2004; Flash MX 2004; JRun 4: and TopStyle Pro 3.1. There are four browsers available, IE, Mozilla Firefox, Netscape and Opera and eight extensions to add to your DW program to help you create web sites with more ease.
Last but not least there are the files to go with the activities in each chapter so you can follow along with what is being discussed. I would suggest once you have read through the book that you sit down at your computer and try out some of the things the book talks about. If you have the time to delve into Dreamweaver, this book will give you a good grasp of what the program contains. Who knows, you may learn one or two things you didn't know DW could do!
