Product Description

Get up and running quickly with Macromedia's hot new Web design tool. Step-by-step instructions paired with loads of screen shots make this easy-to-use guide a must for anyone new to Dreamweaver.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2436301 in Books
• Published on: 1998-08-15
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 375 pages

Amazon.com Review
This approachable guide focuses on newcomers to both Windows and Macintosh versions of Macromedia Dreamweaver 1.2 and can help anyone learn how to create Web pages with this software in a relatively short amount of time. You first learn how to work in the Dreamweaver interface and create basic Web pages with text and images. Next you format text and paragraphs; add images and change image properties; add links, tables, frames, and forms; work with style sheets, libraries, custom objects, behaviors, and layers; and include Shockwave and Flash plug-ins and Java and ActiveX components. Finally, the author explains the problems of browser compatibility and helps you create a site that will work well with any browser. The author also shows you how to use Dreamweaver to upload and manage your site. Each chapter includes clear, short descriptions of each feature, large screen shots, instructions on accomplishing various tasks, and tips on shortcuts and other usability issues. There are also short sidebars on ancillary topics, such as learning URL-naming conventions, specifying hyperlink colors, and naming tables. Appendices include tips on Web-page design and typography as well as information on using image-map editors and other HTML editors with Dreamweaver. --Kathleen Caster

From Library Journal
Dreamweaver is a do-everything web design and management tool that runs on both Macs and Windows. The difficult part for some people to understand is that Dreamweaver does everything from simple HTML to style sheets, layers, and communicating with Java. Once users discover that Dreamweaver makes a lot of this confusing technology easier, they become converts. Both of these titles are good introductions to Dreamweaver, but the concise explanation and visual layout of Peachpit's is easier to understand. On the other hand, IDG's includes a 30-day free use copy of the program. If you can afford it, get both.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From the Back Cover
easy, and inexpensive way to make Web pages with Macromedia's new and sophisticated Web page editor, a designer-targeted WYSIWYG Web authoring tool. Instructions in this book are clear and concise, and they're complemented by hundreds of screenshots and practical illustrations of real-world Web pages created with Dreamweaver.

Whether you're just starting to learn the basics of Web page design or looking to build on your HTML expertise, this book will give you a thorough grounding in Dreamweaver's versatile capabilities--from creating basic Web pages to creating dynamic content using style sheets, layers, DHTML, and scripted behaviors. Nearly every chapter includes sections that go beyond Dreamweaver's WYSIWYG visual editing to working directly with the code to enhance your pages. Other topics include frames, client-side image maps, Web site management, and browser compatibility.

Customer Reviews

Nice Overview and Explanations
I was very pleased with this book. For a low cost, it provides you with a comprehensive explanation of Dreamweaver's capabilities and how to achieve the effects you want. As the title suggests, you get excellent pictures to help explain the concepts.

I found the book to be well organized. J. Tarin Towers avoids repetitiveness and babbling and gets right to the point. Once you complete the book, it acts as a nice reference to quickly look something up - should you forget.

The book even teaches you some HTML as it goes along. So if you're unfamiliar with some HTML commands, you'll get help from the author so you'll know what is going on. However, I wouldn't rely simply on this book if you're completely new to HTML.

My only complaint about this book is the online appendix. You are required to go to this book's complimentary website in order to get information on the following 3 things: The Image Map Editor, Roundtrip HTML, and Browser Compatibility. Why not just include them with the book? Some of those things seem odd to include in an appendix, too (e.g., include the image map section with the chapter on Working with Images). The whole website ordeal seemed suspicious to me.

Despite the quirks with the appendices, I found this book to be quite informative. It goes through and explains Dreamweaver's functions successfully and quickly. Let's face it, you don't want to bore yourself reading a book 2 inches thick on how to use a fairly simple program. You want to quickly get through a no nonsense book and actually use the program. And for that, The Dreamweaver Visual Quickstart is what you need.

Like all Visual QuickStart books, EXCELLENT.
I read it cover to cover in less than 3 days. I went from knowing "0" about how to fully use DW to giving advice and tech support to co-workers. I even upgraded to DW 2.0 because I read a friend's QuickStart book for 2.0 and saw all the new features. Just about all of the VQS books are GOLD! The local university requires its Graphic Design students to buy them too :)

It's an excelent book for beginners
I work designing web sites, but I had to teach Dreamweaver. So, I used this book as a guideline for my course.