Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #10184 in Software
• Brand: Adobe
• Model: 23200142
• Platforms: Windows 98, Windows 2000, Windows NT
• Format: CD-ROM
• Number of items: 1
• Dimensions: 3.50" h x 8.50" w x 9.50" l, 2.70 pounds

Amazon.com Review
Adobe's latest revision of its Web publishing application continues to mature into a powerful and sophisticated tool. Packed with new features, Adobe GoLive 5.0 offers enhanced source-code control to help Web teams edit and maintain large sites; improved linking of Photoshop, Illustrator, and LiveMotion files; and a new interface that's designed to increase efficiency.

For designers who like to get under the hood, GoLive 5.0 now features simultaneous viewing of HTML source code and a WYSIWYG view of the page itself. Each window is editable, and changes take place immediately in both windows. GoLive also can import native Photoshop, Illustrator, and LiveMotion documents. When you double-click on an element in GoLive, the document is opened in the application that created it. After changes are made in the native application and the document is saved, the file is automatically updated in GoLive.

Two welcome new features are the History palette for going back in time and undoing a set of actions, and the Alignment palette for accurately lining up and distributing rows and columns of elements.

If GoLive has a drawback, it's the number of palettes that sprawl across the screen; a high-resolution monitor or dual-monitor setup goes a long way toward alleviating the crowd factor. Compatibility with Photoshop 6 and Illustrator 9 is problematic, but presumably a patch or some new version of GoLive (version 5.1?) is imminent; they are, after all, part of the same Adobe family.

Clearly, Adobe's GoLive 5.0 has some stiff competition (namely, Macromedia's Dreamweaver), but GoLive also has some virtues of its own. If you're already comfortable with other Adobe applications, GoLive's learning curve should present only a small hurdle. The application is stable and deep, and has enough features to help any site designer build almost any kind of site. --Mike Caputo-- This review was written for the Macintosh Version of GoLive 5.0.

Amazon.com Product Description
With over 100 new features, Adobe GoLive 5.0 is a Web-authoring and site-management tool for creative professionals worldwide. Keep your code clean and lean with 360Code; visually design dynamically generated Web pages with Dynamic Link for ASP; and enjoy seamless integration with Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, and Adobe LiveMotion. Move from creative concepts to dynamic, high-impact Web sites with the power of one of the industry's most comprehensive and integrated Web applications.

From Winmag®
Despite a slightly delayed release, Adobe's GoLive 5.0 raises the performance bar another notch for web design programs. Graphically oriented designers will enjoy the program's drag-and-drop simplicity and tight integration with other Adobe packages such as PhotoShop and Illustrator; and serious coders should appreciate GoLive's new customization options and 360Code feature that protects existing code from undesired modification.

The wide variety of tools in GoLive can be overwhelming for neophytes and there are, unfortunately, no wizards to help jumpstart projects. But once you're over the initial learning curve, GoLive's broad tool set is both efficient and powerful.

For example, you can use GoLive's Layout editor to visually lay out your page, dragging and dropping design elements from the program's extensive Objects and Actions palettes. At any time you can switch to a frame editor, HTML source editor, collapsible HTML outline editor, or check your work in the Layout Preview window or in your favorite browser. GoLive supports pixel-precise designs using Cascading Style Sheet-based "floating boxes" and can automatically generate table-based versions for compatibility with older browsers.

GoLive supports many of the latest web standards, including Cascading Style Sheets (CSS 2) and Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG). The program includes a capable multimedia editor that can incorporate QuickTime and Flash elements.

GoLive's updated interface is the same for both PCs and Macs and more closely matches that of other Adobe products, a plus for designers who need to switch between programs or platforms. Each new version has introduced more floating tool palettes; luckily, users without 50" monitors can combine palettes to free up screen space. I liked the new Table palette that makes selecting, formatting and sorting cells, columns and rows a snap. On the other hand, I would have been more excited about the History palette -- which provides an undoable list of your last twenty edits -- if it didn't reset itself every time I moved between the Layout and HTML Source editors.

Not only does GoLive 5.0 now look more like Adobe packages, it is also more tightly integrated with them. Using the new SmartObject feature you can place PhotoShop, Illustrator and LiveMotion on pages and GoLive can generate an optimized web version using the same "Save for Web" feature familiar to PhotoShop users. Double-clicking on the SmartObject opens the source application and any subsequent changes are automatically reflected in the GoLive layout.

GoLive doesn't skimp when it comes to web site planning and management. There's the handy Site window that summarizes site files, external links, errors and other useful information. Adobe has added a powerful Site Builder that diagrams your site's pages and links, and allows you to rearrange or create pages on the fly. You'll also find a report option that will produce lists of pages that match a wide range of criteria -- everything from use of a specific color or font to those pages over a specific size or with a certain number of links away from another page. A Site Export feature lets you create multiple versions of the same site to support different browsers.

GoLive's already solid file transfer options have been improved by support for WebDAV. This allows members of a workgroup to check files in and out while editing, minimizing confusion and simplifying synchronization. Many web servers have not yet enabled WebDAV, but as web design projects increasingly become the domain of teams rather than individuals, this feature is likely to increase in importance.

Another addition is GoLive's Dynamic Link feature. It lets you connect to ODBC-compliant databases and generates Active Server Page code for basic database tasks. While limited to use with web servers supporting ASP and not as powerful as database-focused programs such as Dreamweaver UltraDev, Dynamic Link can get you started creating database-enabled sites.

Finally, GoLive's JavaScript Software Development Kit lets you both customize existing GoLive features and extend the program with new features. This should be a welcome addition for advanced users with special development needs.

The question for some may be how well GoLive 5.0 stacks up against market leader Macromedia's Dreamweaver 3? The short answer is that, with this latest version, GoLive is a serious competitor. Despite an increasingly similar set of features, each product approaches web design and site maintenance tasks differently, and the "GoLive versus Dreamweaver" debate will likely rage on unresolved like "Pepsi versus Coke" and "less filling versus tastes great."

For now, GoLive's new capabilities make it the visual web design package to beat, and it replaces NetObjects Fusion on our WinList.

Customer Reviews

Adobe GoLive 5.0
Adobe GoLive 5.0 is a web design program that offers flexibility -- you can create a website visually or by HTML coding. Easy to use FTP upload and download options. Great value.

not full version of program - no quoted in ad
still trying to return this program - it is a student version and I need the full version - how do I return it?