Dreamweaver CS4

Design, develop, and maintain standards-based websites and applications

Build world class websites and applications with Adobe Dreamweaver CS4. Manipulate pixel-perfect designs, craft complex code, or do both with speed and grace. Dreamweaver CS4 creates leading-edge digital experiences that blend CSS best practices with web-standards compliant layouts for the web, digital devices or desktop applications.

Adobe Dreamweaver CS4 software is the perfect tool for web designers, coders, and application developers at all levels. Enhanced coding functions make it a breeze to navigate through complex site pages at design time. Improved layout tools expedite workflows from comp conception to client approval. Innovations throughout Dreamweaver CS4 help teams and individual developers alike reach the next levels in performance and functionality.

The striking new user interface of Dreamweaver CS4 is both an aesthetic pleasure and highly efficient. Web professionals of every stripe will find a workspace arrangement to fit their style, or they can customize their own. The revised user interface shares a uniform look and overall functionality with other key members of the Adobe Creative Suite® 4 family including Adobe Photoshop® CS4 Extended and Adobe Flash® CS4 Professional software.

Bring the future of web design to your desktop with the advanced code handling found in Dreamweaver CS4. From the integrated web-standard CSS to support for world-class JavaScript frameworks, Dreamweaver CS4 redefines the world of web authoring.

Explore your code rapidly while viewing the page in the real-world browser rendition of the new Live View.

With Dreamweaver CS4, you can:

Create next-generation web experiences. Work in a real-world view of your CSS, JavaScript, and other dynamic, rich media content directly in Dreamweaver CS4. Navigate precisely from a selected page element to its code, regardless of where it is located. Integrate third-party web widgets from the most popular JavaScript frameworks into your pages.

Learn best practices. Design visually with CSS best practices. Create Ajax-driven interactivity while supporting accessibility and best practices in your completed pages.

Take control of your content. Enable content authors to update web pages directly in their browsers. Add dynamic data to your site without a database or complex coding.

Top new features of Dreamweaver CS4

Adobe Dreamweaver CS4 extends the reach of professional coders, designers, and developers with a full complement of new features.

Live View

View your web pages under real-world browser conditions with the new Live View--while still retaining direct access to the code. This new rendering mode, which uses the open-source rendering engine WebKit, displays your designs like a standards-based browser. Changes to the code are immediately reflected in the rendered display.

Combine Live View with Live Code to reveal code as rendered in an interactive state, like hovering over and selecting a Spry data image. Armed with these details, you can quickly modify relevant CSS rules.

However, Live View is no ordinary static viewport. Trigger your CSS-based navigation to view hover states or pull-down submenus, and freeze your page at any point to review the generated code. Dreamweaver CS4 combines the beauty of real-world rendering with the brains of interactive coding.

Related Files and Code Navigator

Dreamweaver CS4 introduces two new features that will help you more efficiently manage the various files that make up the modern web page. The Related Files feature displays all the documents associated with your current page--whether CSS, JavaScript, PHP or XML--in a bar along the top of your primary document. Click any related file to edit its source in Code View while viewing the parent page in Design View. Changes made to the related file code are immediately reflected in Design View.

Prefer to work at the code level? The new Code Navigator pop-up window shows you links to all the code sources that affect your current selection. A click in either Code or Design View brings up the Code Navigator, which displays CSS rules, server-side includes, external JavaScript functions, Dreamweaver templates, Library files, iframe source files, and more.

CSS best practices

Implement CSS best practices without writing code. The new CSS tab in the Properties panel shows the styles for the current selection as well as all the applicable CSS rules. Hover over any property to view a tool tip with no-jargon English explanations of CSS principles. New CSS rules can be created and applied in the Properties panel and stored in the same document or an external style sheet. Dreamweaver CS4 even gives you control over the specificity of your rule: Just click Less Specific or More Specific in the updated New CSS Rule dialog box to target your style precisely.

Switch to CSS on the redesigned Properties panel to quickly modify existing CSS rules or create new ones.

Code hinting for Ajax and JavaScript frameworks

Write JavaScript more quickly and accurately with improved support for JavaScript core objects and primitive data types. Advanced code-hinting functionality helps you power through your code, whether you're adding functions to defined primitive data types (including Object, Array, Number, RegExp, or String) or DOM objects such as Window, Screen, Document, or Event. Dreamweaver CS4 also extends code-hinting muscle to your most advanced custom functions with support for parameters, class constructors, and nested objects, updated in real time as you modify your related JavaScript files.

Put the extended coding functionality of Dreamweaver CS4 to work by incorporating popular JavaScript frameworks including jQuery, Prototype, and Spry. Simply attach the appropriate external JavaScript files, and Dreamweaver automatically displays code hints on demand. Built-in syntax error detection helps you craft the bulletproof code you need--the first time, and every time.

Once you've included a framework source file like prototype.js, code hinting for framework methods and functions are automatically available.

Adobe InContext Editing

Enable content authors to edit their own web pages without additional software installations--and, at the same time, free yourself up to design more. The new online InContext Editing service from Adobe lets anyone who can use a browser update content quickly and easily. Design your editable pages in Dreamweaver CS4 to retain total control over the look and feel of your sites. Then, simply designate the parts of the page you want your clients to be able to change; all other sections of the page are locked, and editable only by you. Easily set CSS styles to ensure entered content is properly and consistently formatted. Dreamweaver gives you the tools to create the perfect website, and hosted InContext Editing lets your clients keep that site up-to-date. (InContext Editing is one of several online services available from Dreamweaver CS4. For more information, see Creative Pro Online Services on page 7.)

HTML data sets

The lure of dynamic data is strong, but learning to use databases or XML can be daunting. Dreamweaver CS4 combines accessibility with ease of use in the new HTML data sets feature. With HTML data sets functionality, you create your data in a standard HTML table, a series of div tags, or even an unordered list, and then choose Insert > Spry > Spry Data Set to integrate that data into a dynamic table on the page, complete with sortable columns, a master-detail layout, or other sophisticated displays. It's easier than ever, with real-time previews of your data--both for selection and results. Spry Data Set also works with XML files to render information from RSS feeds and other sources.

With Spry data sets, define your data in standard tables, whether text or images, including thumbnails and larger images.

Photoshop Smart Objects

Integration between Photoshop and Dreamweaver has evolved to the next level of compatibility and functionality. Simply drag and drop a Photoshop PSD file into a Dreamweaver CS4 page to create an image Smart Object. Unlike standard web-page graphics, a Smart Object is tightly linked to its source file. A small indicator on the Smart Object in Dreamweaver CS4 shows when the source and instance are in sync. When you make any changes to the source image, Dreamweaver notes that the files are out of sync; just click the Update from Original icon in the Properties panel to immediately update your image without opening Photoshop.

The green symbol in the upper left corner of a PSD file inserted into Dreamweaver tells you that the source file and web-ready instance are in sync.

But Smart Objects are more clever still. Let's say you have a logo placed throughout your site in a variety of sizes as Smart Objects. Any updates made to the Photoshop file can be applied individually to the associated Smart Objects on a page-by-page basis, or to all of them at once through the Assets panel. Unique sizes are maintained while the image itself is faithfully resampled. Best of all, the Smart Object evolution is built on top of current Photoshop and Dreamweaver integration, so you can still copy image selections from Photoshop and paste them in Dreamweaver for an easy comp-to-layout workflow. Moreover, you're free to rescale Photoshop images in Dreamweaver to fine-tune your design with no image degradation or revisits to Photoshop.

Subversion integration

When a collaborative project requires a team of designers and developers, open-source Subversion software is often used to handle version control. Dreamweaver CS4 integrates Subversion for a more robust check-in/check-out experience with file versioning, rollback, and more. Once you've defined Subversion as your version-control system, you can update your site to get the latest versions of its pages. Modified pages can be checked into a Subversion repository directly from within Dreamweaver--no third-party utility or command line interface is required. Dreamweaver can also revert checked-out files or mark conflicts as resolved to complete the team site-building experience.

Adobe AIR authoring support

Create multi-platform desktop applications from your Dreamweaver HTML and JavaScript sites with new Adobe AIR authoring support. Download and install the latest version of the Adobe AIR Extension for Dreamweaver to begin creating engaging, branded applications that run on all major desktop operating systems using your existing web development resources with Adobe AIR. For a streamlined workflow, you can repurpose your existing assets into Adobe AIR desktop applications without leaving Dreamweaver. Preview your Adobe AIR applications within Dreamweaver CS4 to make sure everything is working as designed. When you're ready, prepare your application for deployment with Adobe AIR packaging and code-signing features. Dreamweaver also serves as an Adobe AIR development platform for custom applications. Adobe AIR applications run online or off--they can even be used to access a persistent data source populated from your database.

Export your HTML and JavaScript applications to Adobe AIR directly from within Dreamweaver and run them online or off.

What's new in Adobe Bridge CS4

Adobe Bridge CS4--included with Adobe Dreamweaver CS4--is a visual file browser that helps you search, view, and sort through many assets to quickly find the ones you want. New features and enhancements include:

• Faster performance from startup to browsing, including an option to display previews embedded in raw images
• Easier access to task-based workspaces
• A new List view with rich data and familiar sorting controls
• Built-in preview and creation of HTML and Flash web galleries, and PDF contact sheets
• One-click full-screen previews
• Collections for organizing related assets in freeform or search-based virtual groups--even when assets are spread across multiple folders
• Fast, detailed search results thanks to tight integration with Spotlight in Mac OS X and Desktop Search in Windows Vista
• New review modes, such as Carousel View for quickly cycling through assets
• Smart analysis and auto-stacking of High Dynamic Range (HDR) and panoramic images for handoff to Photoshop
• New support for previewing 3D images
• Camera Raw improvements, including non-destructive application of dodge, burn, sharpen, and other adjustments

New user interface

Work faster and smarter across Dreamweaver CS4 and other components of Creative Suite 4, thanks to a new level of integration and common user-interface elements. A common interface means a more natural process as you move from Photoshop or Fireworks to Flash to Dreamweaver. Stack or minimize your docked panels to maximize your visual or coding environment; click once to pull out a panel and expose desired properties, and then click again to put it away. Work in new Split Code View to display your code in two different sections simultaneously, or choose the new Horizontal Split View option for a different perspective. Quickly move from one layout organization to another with the Workspace pull-down list. You can choose from a series of predesigned layouts--like those for application coders or designers--or create your own custom work environments for the ultimate in personalized workspaces.

Panels, like the CSS Styles panel, can be quickly expanded to make modifications to your web page and, with a click, collapsed to allow maximum screen real estate for your design.

Creative Pro Online Services

Connect to the power of the online community through your creative desktop. New online services accessed from within Dreamweaver CS4 let you search for help from the online community; share your screen with colleagues or clients in a few quick clicks; more easily and efficiently manage day-to-day web content updates; and more. With new online services in Creative Suite 4, you can take your ideas to the next level.

Adobe Community Help. Get the power of an online search engine within your Creative Suite 4 software, but with more targeted results thanks to Adobe Community Help. Searchable content includes the in-depth product-specific Help that Adobe has always delivered, plus additional Adobe and third-party content chosen by experts at Adobe and in the design and production communities. With Adobe Community Help, you can find the focused answers you need, fast. (Internet connection required for extended content.)

Acrobat.com. Acrobat.com is a set of online services--file sharing and storage, PDF converter, online word processor, and web conferencing--that you can use to create and share documents, communicate in real time, and simplify working with others. Thanks to the connection between one of the Acrobat.com services, Adobe ConnectNow, and Dreamweaver CS4, you can meet live over the web to share your screen, present creative concepts and ideas, and brainstorm with up to two online guests for no additional service charge. To share your screen with colleagues and clients, choose File > Share My Screen. Guests can then see your desktop on their screens as you work. You can exchange ideas using the chat pod, add a live video or audio feed, or use the Whiteboard feature to enable guests to comment on content. You can even temporarily hand over control of the screen to a guest to collaborate on a file. Additional Acrobat.com services, such as Share, Create PDF, My Files, and Adobe Buzzword, are accessible via your web browser. (Internet connection required.)

InContext Editing. Make your web page content available for online editing by others when you use InContext Editing. Offer your colleagues, clients or end users an easier way to make simple edits without impacting the design integrity of your web pages--and without help from you or additional software on their computers. Use the InContext Editing toolbar in Dreamweaver to set up your web pages, and then use the preview of this online service to enable content changes by others. (This service will be available as a preview technology, and accessible from within Adobe Dreamworks CS4. During this preview, you can use it at no additional charge. Further availability information will be posted to www.adobe.com/ dreamweaver when appropriate. Internet connection required). For more details, see InContext Editing on page 4.

Adobe Bridge Home. Visit Adobe Bridge Home--an online channel available in Adobe Bridge CS4--and stay up to date with what's new from Adobe and the design, web development, and video and audio production communities at large. Watch the latest video tutorials for your Creative Suite 4 software, listen to a podcast interview with a leading designer, or learn about the next training event in your community. Discover tips and resources that can help you work smarter and faster, making the most of Dreamweaver CS4. (Internet connection required.)

Part of the Adobe Creative Suite 4 family

Adobe tightly integrates Dreamweaver into the full range of Creative Suite 4 solutions for print, production and, of course, web. Shared user-interface elements like collapsible panels facilitate moving from one Creative Suite component to another.

For a complete Dreamweaver web-centric solution, turn to Adobe Creative Suite 4 Web Premium or Adobe Creative Suite 4 Web Standard software. Web Standard brings you the basic functionality you'll need to produce exemplary websites, while Web Premium adds Photoshop CS4 Extended, Illustrator CS4, and Acrobat® 9 Pro software to further fuel your creative ambitions. If you're looking for a a full cross-media solution to take content from print to web to device, get Adobe Creative Suite 4 Design Premium, which features InDesign® CS4 in addition to Photoshop CS4 Extended, Illustrator CS4 and Dreamweaver CS4 among other components. Dreamweaver is also a component of Adobe Creative Suite 4 Master Collection software--the ultimate bundle of creative tools.

System Requirements
Windows
• 1GHz or faster processor
• Microsoft® Windows® XP with Service Pack 2 (Service Pack 3 recommended) or Windows Vista® Home Premium, Business, Ultimate, or Enterprise with Service Pack 1 (certified for 32-bit Windows XP and Windows Vista)
• 512MB of RAM
• 1GB of available hard-disk space for installation; additional free space required during installation (cannot install on flash-based storage devices)
• 1,280x800 display with 16-bit video card
• DVD-ROM drive
• Broadband Internet connection required for online services