Dreamweaver is the Web development application from Adobe Systems and to get the most out of the program, it's important not only to master the application, but also to understand fundamental concepts of modern Web design.
Dreamweaver CS4 Essential Training attempts to do just that. In this training series, James Williamson covers everything from site structure to the value of standards-compliant XHTML and CSS. He also shows how to create clean and accessible code in Dreamweaver, as well as how to publish compelling content. This course lasts 10.25 hours divided into 18 lessons.
Lessons 1-3 cover the basics of Dreamweaver. This includes the theory of basic site structure, what is an index page, an overview of Web design practices, and explanations of XHTML, JavaScript, and CSS. You will also get an overview of the Dreamweaver interface, as well as a lesson on setting up and managing a site.
Lessons 4 and 5 gets you started with the creation of new documents, what DOCTYPE declarations are, setting up new document preferences, and how to work with starter pages. You then learn the basics of adding text and structuring content, creating lists, getting text into Dreamweaver, and importing Word documents.
Lesson 6, "CSS Foundations," now goes to the heart of the fundamentals of using Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). Understanding some simple rules of using CSS will help you create more efficient style sheets. Here you will explore the anatomy of a CSS rule, setting the preferences, understanding the selectors, and working with external style sheets.
Lesson 7, "Controlling Typography," is important so as to have the ability to get your point across. In this lesson you will see the units of measurement that Dreamweaver will provide for you use. These include font sizing, weight, and style as well as line height, vertical spacing, padding, and alignment of text.
Lesson 8, "Working with Images," begins with how best to manage your images. In Dreamweaver, these are called assets and it is very important for you to manage them so that you can find them when you need them. You will also see how to place them on a page, customize them via CSS, integrate with Photoshop, and even alternate Photoshop workflows.
Lesson 9, "Creating Links," explains that without links, working with the Web would be a pretty tedious task. So creating links is very important for the structure and flow of your site. In this lesson you will see how to create links, set preferences, how to use named anchors, and how to create CSS-based rollovers.
Lesson 10, "Controlling Layout with CSS," will show you that although you may be intimidated in using CSS, that it is in fact easier to control a site by using CSS than it would be otherwise. This is all accomplished by using proper site layout. You will start with the basics, and then learn about structuring and various types of positioning.
Lesson 11, "Working with Tables," examines that while tables are out of favor for creating layouts, they are still needed for the presentation of tabular data, and in fact are one of the best ways of presenting this kind of data to the user. You will begin by reviewing table structure, importing data, styling tables, and adding user interactivity to tables.
Lesson 12, "Working with Forms," starts out with how forms work. Forms are one of those things that allow a user to pass information to your site. While this does not get into processing form data, it does show you how to create assessable forms, set their properties, insert fields, lists, radio button groups, checkboxes, text, and submit buttons. It also covers some form interactivity and the use of Spry validation widgets.
Article comments