Dreamweaver vs. ID, AI, PS, etc....

[Trains1985]

When creating the visual appearance of an average Dreamweaver website, is a majority of it using ID, AI, PS, etc... and DW mainly doing the technical aspects of it?

MFJ

[Rob Hecker2]

Generally no.

Photoshop and Illustrator may be used for preparing images, but the site structure, design, and content are handled in DW.

To use DW you must know how to code HTML and CSS (minimum requirements).

[Nancy OShea · Accepted solution]

I can honestly say, I have never used InDesign for web work.  To my mind, ID is best suited to print projects -- brochures, business cards, product packaging, and maybe eBooks. 

Conceptual comps can be created in Photoshop during Phase 1 of project.  It gives you some preliminaries to show the client.  Once the conceptual comps and site requirements are fully nailed down, then you translate it in Dreamweaver to HTML (structure), CSS (styles & layout), JavaScript (interactivity) and possibly much more depending on project.

Illustrator is useful because it's a vector graphics app.  So if you're tasked with creating logos, branding, icons and such, then that's a good choice because you can export them to SVG.   Scalable vector graphics are a must in responsive web design.

If you're in a hurry, starting projects with a pre-built HTML & CSS Layout can speed up production and reduce costs.   But don't think for a moment that purchasing a commercial Template can help you if you don't understand the code it's built on.   Some templates are very complex.  If you don't know code, they won't save you time and could actually put you behind schedule.

Nancy