What is Dreamweaver MX?

Dreamweaver MX is among the last of commercial software’s big guns to straggle into Mac OS X nativity, and the answer to the $64,000 question is: Yes, Dreamweaver MX is worth the upgrade — if you use OS X and/or develop or maintain database-driven Web sites. If you’re content with Dreamweaver 4 in Mac OS 9, MX’s new features probably aren’t worth the ducats.

For the rest of us, Dreamweaver looks great in Aqua. We don’t have the option of the new Windows-esque (and Windows-only) Integrated interface, which we’ll gladly forgo in light of the retrofitted Objects bar; you can still flip it back to its traditional spot sitting vertically at the upper-left edge of your screen, but if you leave it in the new default position (horizontal at the upper left), you’ll enjoy a tabbed interface that provides access to all 12 groups of Objects (Common, Layout, Characters, Script, and so on). Another new interface perk is the stackable, groupable Panels, which hold Dreamweaver’s multitudinous tool windows. What’s missing is a save option for your custom arrangements, which other apps (such as Dreamweaver’s nemesis, Adobe GoLive) employ. The addition of this feature would give you handy menu-bar access to your own streamlined setups for different types of work (visual design versus database integration, for example).

The proof lies in how the tools work, though, and MX continues the Dreamweaver tradition of robust, smart tools. MX is more savvy than ever when you need to dig into the raw code. HomeSite (the Wintel world’s answer to BBEdit) is now built into Dreamweaver, or at least its coding tools are — bringing features such as Code Hints to help you write code; Tag Editors for modifying tags; a Snippets window where you can store frequently used bits of code; and the allimportant Validator, which lets you specify which specs to use in validating your code. And the choices are vast: HTML (versions 2.0, 3.2, or 4.0), three flavors of XHTML, SMIL, WML, JSP, specific Web browsers, and all versions of ColdFusion.

Naturally, Dreamweaver is geared to play well with ColdFusion (Macromedia’s server solution), which is part of the Studio MX kit... and runs on Windows and some Unix and Linux platforms but not on Macs. If your server is Mac OS X, Dreamweaver has also learned PHP (along with ASP, jSP, and NET). And for all these alien Web technologies, as well as HTML, XML, XHTML, JavaScript, and Cascading Style Sheets, Dreamweaver ships with precoded components, usable samples, and code libraries, as well as onboard reference manuals for most of them.

Macromedia smartly added a Site Definition wizard to walk you through the details of setting up a new site (including basic directory information, your Web host’s FTP settings, and database integration). Where the Definition wizard doesn’t help is with configuring the much-ballyhooed SSH (secure FTP) support, which requires downloading and configuring a third-party SSH client to work with Dreamweaver’s FTP client.

All told, Dreamweaver MX runs well in Mac OS X — better than it does in OS 9, though not very differently than the previous version ran in OS 9, save for one key area: Tables are much easier to handle in MX.

Now you can select, resize, and otherwise work with rows or cells according to your whim, not Dreamweaver’s. If you’ve been begrudgingly tolerating Dreamweaver’s table manners, this improvement alone may justify the upgrade.

Coucouvanis, Niko. (September 2002). Dreamweaver MX. MacAddict. (pg. 44).

Download Dreamweaver MX for Mac

Architecture

IBM PowerPC

System Requirements

From Mac OS 9.1 up to Mac OS 10.5

Compatibility notes

Mac OS 9.1 - Mac OS X 10.1 or later

At least 96MB of RAM

A monitor supporting 1024x768 resolution with at least 256 colors depth (8-bits)

Mac OS Runtime for Java (MRJ) 2.2 or above (included on the Dreamweaver MX CD)

Version 4.0 or later of Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Internet Explorer

Emulating this? It could probably run under: SheepShaver