Participant

Question

Is Dreamweaver still relevant?

Forum|Forum|4 years ago
April 23, 2021
4 replies
9581 views

Recently I've been exploring some more designer friendly options in this space for upcoming projects and decided to give Dreamweaver another look after not using it in many years. I have to say, I'm extreamly underwelmed. It's like Adobe sucked all the joy out of the product. Is it functional? Sure. Can you build a site with it? I guess but Adobe is making me not want to with this product. The interface has never been all that great but now it is even more cludgy and confusing, while feeling bloated and slow. I really don't know who this app is targeting, designers or developers? Regardless, they are most certainly missing the boat on both accounts. I would hope that someone over there is looking at tools like Webflow or Blocs, both of which are doing some intresting things in regards to layout. Heck, even some of the wordpress editors like Elementor and CSS Hero are worth a gander. These tools are not only functional but at least, for me, they bring back that since of wonder joy that seems to be missing and leaves me to ponder the question, is Dreamweaver still relevant in 2021?

This topic has been closed for replies.

Nancy OShea

Community Expert

...looking at tools like Webflow or Blocs, even some of the wordpress editors like Elementor and CSS Hero...

============

That's fine if all you want is drag & drop "ease of use" and a lifelong commitment to their proprietary code, templates, widgets and in some cases web hosting. I'm not interested in being a slave to a particular ecosystem when I don't have to.

The web is a lot more sophisticated today than it was a few years ago. And layout is just one small piece of a much larger picture. If you're looking for the "Holy Grail" of web authoring tools, good luck. I don't think there is a web authoring tool anywhere that can do everything and do it well for all skill levels. If there is one, I've yet to find it. That's why good developers use different tools for different tasks. Try everything and use whatever works best for you.

Good luck!

Nancy O'Shea— Product User & Community Expert

BenPleysier

Community Expert

I think that the best free-of-charge editor is Visual Studio. Having said that, I tend to use Wappler with much satisfaction. Wappler is what Dremweaver could have been if Adobe had listened to the `real` users.

Wappler is the DMXzone-made Dreamweaver replacement and includes the best of their powerful extensions, as well as much more!

P

Paul-M

Legend

Code Editor : Like John I prefer the old pre CC 2017 editor, it was much more stable and better IMO. If they brought the old cold editor back with some updates I'd be very happy.

Live View: Has been problematic with performance issues and glitches.... Don't really use so can't comment on the most recent versions and how much it has improved.

Server Side Tools: Adobe removed them and forced people to pay for third party tools.

Site Management: As a Site Management tool it's good, the introduction of GIT a few years ago was a welcome addition.

Paul-M - Community Expert

B i r n o u

Legend

I think Dreamweaver is not the flagship it used to be. It is true that its features have been reduced and have not been able to adapt as all the alternative solutions out there have done.
However, in terms of project management, coupled with Bridge, Dreamweaver remains in my opinion a tool without comparison, nor alternative. Well, having said that, it is imperative to code outside, and to set up your own preview flow.

Jon Fritz

Community Expert

Is DW still relevant?

In what way?

As a code editor? Sure, though I think it was better before Brackets was added to it.
As a site management tool? Yes. I still haven't found anything that works better for managing local files.
As a visual design tool? No, not really.

J

Jon5C1DAuthor

Participant

That's my point, it doesn't really excell at any one thing. I will conceede site management to you, however I can't recall the last time I did a local push.

O

osgood_

Legend

In my opinion, no. Adobe cannot or refuses to compete in this area any longer, probably for good financial reasons. Once the market becomes saturated the slice of the financial pie reduces and becomes rather unnattractive to large coporations.

Adobe appear to only be interested in sectors where there is little to no competition like dtp, image manipulation, video editing where they undoubtedly offer the best solutions.

If you look, particularly at the first 2, dtp and image manipulation, name the competition, very few apart from infinity. Now name the competition where web production is concerned and theres no stopping the deluge. Wix has recently launched their answer to Webflow, Editor X.

The problem with most of these solutions, whilst being by far and away superior in what options they offer they tie you in to a workflow as the tools are web based and some are non transportable in terms of hosting as they rely on branded content management systems.

Dreamweaver is still a reasonable simple code editor but not much else other than a premium price tag compared to its competitors which are either free or come at a much lower cost, for instance Pinegrow.

Lets be honest here DW is probably viewed now as a freeby to anyone that has a full cloud subscription. I cant see who would pay for it as a single product item when there are better options available and you get more bang for your buck, that is just my opinion based on watching what is going on in the webdev world.

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