Our civic association wants to create a web page and just purchased Dreamweaver 4.
Just before our web team started the project, a new member with absolutely zero web design experience said he thinks we might want to learn FrontPage 2002 before tackling Dreamweaver, “just to have the added knowledge and experience.” (For what it’s worth, he’s a school administrator by training.)
Doesn’t make sense to me, but then I know HTML only at the beginner’s level and maybe I’m not seeing the big picture.
All the webdesiners I know use Dreamweaver. I don’t know why he suggested Front Page . . . .I wouldn’t say it’s any easier to use but I have been doing web design for a long time so know the ropes. Why don’t you ask him to clarify?
Your team member is essentially arguing that if you want to learn to drive a car, you should start by learning how to drive a tricycle. There is nothing in Frontpage that you need to know. Just go straight for Dreamweaver, it is a well written package.
May I chime in with a loud, prolonged, and heartfelt AMEN? Having had occasion to work with both Dreamweaver and FrontPage on the same project once…
If he’s fairly techno-savvy, he’ll do just fine with Dreamweaver; otherwise it may take a while for some of the concepts to gel for him. My experience with non-tech learners is that it just takes a while for them to get it - but they usually do. Even so, it’s a better choice than Front Page - especially if he thinks he’s going to go from one to the other.
You’ll get a better and more flexible design with Dreamweaver. Front Page is ok as far as it goes, but why drive the Pinto when you’ve already got the Beemer.
I can’t comment on the latest edition of Frontpage but the ones before it were terrible. It fills your code with tosh and rubbish.
I started off with Frontpage and then went onto Dreamweaver. I much prefer Dreamweaver. Also I work for an Internet design company and all the designers use Dreamweaver.
His response was: “We need to be able to walk first before we can run.”
DreamWeaver’s much better. It was clearly written for a Mac and ported to a PC, so initially some of the concepts are funky for a PC-oriented person, but it’s an excellent program. Also, once you understand the interface, moving to other MacroMedia products, especially Fireworks and Flash are easy.
I agree with the above.
Dreamweaver is much nicer interface (although, less intuitive right at first). It also outputs MUCH cleaner html…
There is one more option. It is just about as to learn HTML as it is to master either of those programs. Why not get a nice code editor (textpad comes to mind) and write by hand? It is easy, and your code will be much cleaner in the end.
To put it politely, that associate of yours that suggested that you even consider using the ‘f’ word to design a web site should be taken out the back and beaten senseless with a sack full of Windows 98 CD-ROMs.
Dreamweaver Rocks! Frontpage sucks something that rhymes with rocks!
The Shootout from a much respected source. Check it out:
http://hotwired.lycos.com/webmonkey/01/39/index4a.html
FWIW, I agree with the conclusions.
I do all my HTML coding in pico 
Actually, I do use Dreamweaver 4, but I never go out of code mode. I don’t use it as a WYSIWYG editor.
It’s a convenient editor because it has both the code view and the FTP client in the same package.
FrontPage is evil.
Notepad works better than either package. (Because you know what is happening with the code)
Eric
Or try HomeSite which is like color-coded Notepad. It is very easy to go between the normal text editor and the WYSIWYG aspect of it. Since Allaire (who made HomeSite) just merged or whatever with Macromedia, it may be a better product even still. (hardly possible, i know!)
I’ve used HomeSite extensively and like it. But it’s not the right product for the OP, and frankly is a dying product. Knowing the inards of HTML is to web design as knowing the inards of post-script is to writing a document. As time goes on, it’ll be moreso.
And this from someone who is pretty darn knowledgable about HTML.