Comments on: Podcast 44: Writing for the web

By: Emmanuel Ulloa

Emmanuel Ulloa — Thu, 03 Aug 2006 16:25:56 +0000

I was thinking that maybe something related to the subject “Is Dreamweaver cheating” is “Are frameworks cheating?”. I mean what’s the real issue here: developers coding from scratch or developers using pre-made code?.
The only framework I’ve used is the one Macromedia setup for DW (Configure a site, create a connection, set the login, create a recordset, use the wizards for master/detail, create and edit). And I know that depending on your IDE the structure/workflow of the site will be different.
Is there any sort of “official” standard for developing a site?
What frameworks would you recommend?
I have read the Smarty (php templating system) manual, looks very good but because of my IDE (DW 8) I’ve never use it. I a my missing my soul as a developer?

By: Dan Acuff

Dan Acuff — Thu, 03 Aug 2006 14:16:23 +0000

Thanks for the perfect points on using DW 8 as a RAD developer tool. What is scary is that compaines like Modem Media / Digitas still have developers using Homesite 5.0 because of some ancient vulture at the top. As pointed out already the autocomplete dropdowns allow 3 keystrokes to the "hand-coders" 17 key strokes. It is basic math. I own DW 8 and I can say I have probably never used the WYSIWYG editor.. To Chris who asked the original question. Ok so even if you don't want to shell out $500 bucks for DW8. By God at least get rid of windows notepad. Do your self a modern day favor and at least check out Notepad ++. It is what I use here at my day job. FREE!/Donataion http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/uk/site.htm Cheers!~

By: Chris Battles

Chris Battles — Thu, 03 Aug 2006 04:17:44 +0000

You asked about other IDE's that we might be using besides DW. Check out TopStyle - it was built by the folks who originally created HomeSite. It has a great free "lite" version as well. TopStyle

By: Andy Mortimer

Andy Mortimer — Mon, 31 Jul 2006 10:50:07 +0000

Another great podcast,
Probably one off my favorite features in dreamweaver is the code navigation button that allows you to jump between functions. This feature for some reason is disabled by default but can be re-enabled by going to C:Program FilesMacromedia[Dreamweaver version here]ConfigurationToolbars and then opening toolbars.xml in there you will find the following block off code commented out
image=”Toolbars/images/MM/codenav.png”
disabledImage=”Toolbars/images/MM/codenav_dis.png”
imageMac=”dwres:18067″
disabledImageMac=”dwres:18080″
tooltip=”Code navigation”
enabled=”dw.getFocus() == ‘textView’ || dw.getFocus() == ‘html’”
menuID=”DWCodeNavPopup”
update=”onViewChange”/>
If you uncomment this and then reopen dreamweaver you will see a new button in code view it looks like {} two curly braces you will now be able to use this to switch between function.
Please make sure you make a backup off the toolbars.xml file before you make any changes.

By: Aussie John

Aussie John — Sat, 29 Jul 2006 06:04:52 +0000

I believe standards should be handled subjectively. Cost and client demand determine the level of conformance and I also beleive that the web site owners should be aware of the cost of conformance and be prepared to wear that cost.
If Css is hard to debug, he (John Dvorak) should retire because it is the easiest language out there.
Code gen and IDE are fundamental to being able to compete in IT, use them, but use them as responsibly as flash should be used.

By: Aussie John

Aussie John — Sat, 29 Jul 2006 05:05:06 +0000

news
3:20 W3C
6:55 CSS
10:15 Standards and getting the job done.
Questions
12:57 Dream weaver
Main
19:56 Cariny about content.
27:20 friendly and personal.
28:35 avoid patronising language
28.44 Scanning and front loading
30:19 Knocked microphone.loI
31:41 avoid jargon
33:38 short sentences.
36:20 focus on audience
Tip
37:36 update regularly
38:40 update with new work.
Review
40:18 feedbarner

By: Austyn

Austyn — Fri, 28 Jul 2006 04:35:38 +0000

Love the podcast as usual. I'm sure some people have seen this, at least if you pay attention to digg but: The company that created the CSS editing software Style Master is doing a CSS Redesign Competition of Dvoraks Blog .

By: Emmanuel Ulloa

Emmanuel Ulloa — Tue, 25 Jul 2006 20:31:53 +0000

If Dreamweaver is cheating then any RAD is cheating. Therefore any Microsoft Development tool is cheating. Luckily for me I know a lot of people who think Dreamweaver is a design tool and think I’m a great developer.
Has anybody used CodeCharge?
I’m listening in San José, Costa Rica, Central America

By: Jason Mayoff

Jason Mayoff — Tue, 25 Jul 2006 18:44:35 +0000

As usual, a very informative podcast.
I have one comment, though, about your description of Dreamweaver’s CSS panel. When your code involves lots of PHP includes and echos and things, for displaying HTML, the CSS panel is useless. It displays absolutely nothing except this bit of useful information “(no styles defined).” It can’t seem to find its way back through the php includes, to find the header file that links to the style sheet and it doesn’t seem to recognize the HTML tags within echos.
(That’s a bit complicated, so I hope I made myself clear.)

By: Ross Johnson

Ross Johnson — Tue, 25 Jul 2006 13:41:21 +0000

Great podcast, I really hope to learn more about effective writing (especially for the web). As it stands now marketing companies or the firms themselves write the content and it is nothing but happy talk and marketing-speak that no one believes or cares about. Hopefully soon I can start offering copy writing services and cut down on the amount of over-marketing-ized websites out there.