Macromedia has introduced a new resource — the Macromedia Solutions CD — designed to help emerging Dreamweaver 4 developers get up to speed faster and increase productivity.
Available today, the CD offers resources for getting started with such Macromedia products as Dreamweaver and Flash. It also offers information on making Web sites accessible to those with disabilities and implementing e-learning sites. The CD is free from now through March 31, 2002, to those who have purchased one of the products in Macromedia’s Dreamweaver and/or Flash line.
“Dreamweaver has long been the top choice for the vast majority of professional Web designers and developers, holding over 70 percent marketshare in the professional development space,” David Morris, Macromedia product manager, told MacCentral. “Now we’re also providing support to developers who are new to Web design or Dreamweaver specifically, and the Macromedia Solutions CD expands on that commitment.”
There are lots of emerging developers who are starting to make the transition from using a beginning HTML editor to a professional editor such as Dreamweaver, he said. As a user-focused company, Macromedia talked to users of various levels and noticed an increasing demand for resources for beginning to intermediate Web designers and developers, Morris added. The Macromedia Solutions CD is targeted to these “emerging Web pros.”
The CDs contains four individual kits: the Dreamweaver Jumpstart Kit, the Flash Jumpstart Kit, the Accessibility Jumpstart Kit, and the E-Learning Jumpstart Kit.
Susan Marshall, a Macromedia director, said the Dreamweaver kit contains videos, excerpts from books, templates and extensions. The videos, in QuickTime format, offer 12 “mini-movies” on the basics of Dreamweaver and the “best practices” of professionals (keyboard shortcuts, etc.), Marshall said. There are also Flash movies created internally at Macromedia that take the learning process to the “next level” and even helps participants build a live site, she added.
The book excerpts come from such firms as O’Reilly Publishing. Macromedia picked out beginner-friendly chapters from a prodigious amount of material, Marshall said.
The CD’s templates are designed to help new users get up and going quickly. There are 10 such templates that were commissioned by Macromedia and designed with the new user in mind, Marshall said.
The extensions — which let users add new features to Dreamweaver from exchange — come from the Macromedia Exchange Web site, a resource for users of the application. The company culled through 400-plus extensions and picked out 25 for the CD that were “particularly relevant” to new users, Marshall said.