A. Where to Learn More

Once you’ve worked through this book, you should be well on your way to creating great webpages with Dreamweaver. But Dreamweaver is such a comprehensive program that there is plenty more to learn about it and about building websites in general.

In this appendix, we’ll point to several of the most helpful Dreamweaver-oriented websites and other sites where you can learn more about building standards-compliant websites, and we’ll even mention a few other books that will help you deepen your knowledge not just of Dreamweaver, but also of web design and JavaScript.

As usual with products that can be found on the Internet, websites come, go, and change addresses with alarming regularity. The sites listed here were in existence when this book went to press and may be available when you check them out, or they may not. We are just reporting the URLs; we have no control over them. If you find a link that has become stale, we would appreciate it if you would drop a note to [email protected] so that we can update the next edition of the book.

Of course, Adobe has a variety of online support options as well.

This should be your first stop when looking for answers to a Dreamweaver question (after this book, of course!) . This site allows you to not just search Adobe’s Dreamweaver resources but also get help from the larger Dreamweaver community. There are also tutorials, videos, articles, and documentation.

Adobe’s support site for Dreamweaver offers help for everyone from absolute beginners to experts who want to become, well, more expert.

Once you go to the URL above, click the link for the Dreamweaver category. This is an aggregator site that lists posts from many people’s Dreamweaver-related blogs . It’s a great way to keep up with the Dreamweaver community.

Adobe’s blog aggregator brings together interesting blog posts about Dreamweaver from all over the web.

blogs.adobe.com/dreamweaver/

This blog is written by the Dreamweaver team, which makes it a great place to find out about the latest happenings directly from the people doing the work .

The Adobe Dreamweaver Team blog gives you the latest information from the folks who build Dreamweaver.

Dreamweaver Developer Center has tutorials focused on the new features of Dreamweaver CC and articles that will help you better use Dreamweaver to build your sites. There are also some additional templates and sample layouts if the ones that came with Dreamweaver aren’t enough for you.

Adobe’s Dreamweaver forums are active and a good place to get help from other knowledgeable users. The Dreamweaver FAQ can also be found here.

WebAssist is one of the premier developers of Dreamweaver extensions and web apps ready to be integrated into your sites . Its Design Extender extension helps you build customized site designs using wizards, with almost no effort. They also sell extensions that let you easily add shopping carts, database-driven back ends, advanced forms, and more to your site.

WebAssist makes a variety of great Dreamweaver extensions, including ways to make customizable site designs and add e-commerce features to your sites.

Besides the paid products, the WebAssist site also contains many tutorials covering CSS, images, navigation, and other subjects.

Tons of constantly updated video content, including podcasts, demos, and tutorials by experts and Adobe employees, are available from Adobe TV , which covers not only Dreamweaver but other Adobe products as well. The site shows off not just released products, but previews of Adobe products that are still in beta. You’ll also find case studies; videos from MAX, Adobe’s annual conference; and non-product-related videos on subjects of interest to creative professionals, such as marketing your skills.

Adobe TV provides a large number of video tutorials and information.

These are our recommended websites to start learning about each.

WordPress started life as blogging software but has grown far beyond that. This is its official website.

knowit.co.nz/category/wordpress

KnowIT is WordPress expert Miraz Jordan’s blog, and this category contains her WP-related articles and how-to’s. She also has ebooks available in the site’s bookstore section.

This is the official website of the Drupal Project.

www.buildamodule.com

This tutorial site has hundreds of videos to help you learn Drupal—some free, but most by subscription. It covers a wide range of topics, from beginner to expert.

This is the official website for the Joomla CMS.

resources.joomla.org

The Joomla Resource Directory is invaluable in pointing you to training, extension providers, support companies, and hosting resources that let you leverage your investment in Dreamweaver and your Joomla site.

The Joomla Resource Directory is your gateway to all things Joomla.

This Dreamweaver mailing list is hosted on Yahoo and is a high-volume list that’s worth a look. You can also ask your questions about Dreamweaver on this list.

Wise-Women is an online community with a website and an email discussion list . The purpose of the list is to provide women on the web with a supportive atmosphere to deal with issues of web development, design, and consulting. Wise-Women was founded in 1999 by one of the authors of this book (Dori) and is going strong today. You’ll find lots of useful information on the mailing list about using Dreamweaver, among many other subjects. And in case you’re wondering, the community is not only for women.

The Wise-Women online community offers support and help for women and men alike.

If you’re looking for ebooks on Dreamweaver or complementary technologies, Creative Edge has them . Or maybe you prefer videos? Creative Edge has those, too. Or maybe you want a book that isn’t available in stores yet? Creative Edge even has those. In fact, as we wrote this appendix, a Rough Cut (a work in progress) of this very book was already available for download—legally, too!

The Creative Edge website offers sneak peeks of upcoming books along with ebooks and videos.

Creative Edge lets you sample books and videos before you buy them. You can even comment on Rough Cuts, giving authors feedback while they can still do something about it.

Lynda.com offers an excellent series of video training programs that cover Dreamweaver and the rest of the Adobe product line, as well as many other software packages . You can purchase these training programs as discs that you can view on your computer, or you can access the videos over the Internet through the Online Training Library, for which you’ll need to purchase a subscription. Tom produced Contribute 3 Essential Training and Quicken 2009 for Windows Essential Training for Lynda.com.

The Lynda.com Online Training Library offers many hours of video training on Dreamweaver.