Sean Hindle (no relation) wrote in July's PCW about the prohibitive cost of using Dreamweaver in schools. I have two points to make.

Firstly I'm afraid it's time to recognise that Adobe's purchase of Macromedia probably spells the end of Dreamweaver.  As a commercial user I've resisted more recent upgrades because of the UK/US price differential, lack of clarity over the future of Adobe's stable of products with two web authoring tools (Adobe GoLive and Macromedia Dreamweaver).

And let's not forget that MS has Expression Quartz, its Dreamweaver-buster up its sleeves, OK there's still a year to wait but I bet it'll be priced to grab market share. Unless a credible third party arrives on the scene during the inevitable Microsoft release date slippage then to paraphrase Edmund Burke "All that is necessary for the triumph of Microsoft is that their competitors stop trying."

Secondly, should you even consider using Dreamweaver in schools?  It's a large and complex product and takes a lot of learning even for a dedicated adult professional.  Would you propose that to lean to fly one should start off in a Boeing 747 or might it make more sense to use a small trainer aircraft?

My son came home demanding access to Dreamweaver because that's what he was using at school and he had an assignment to complete - and finding difficult.  I showed him how to use MS Notepad and edit HTML "the hard way".  He found it much easier and more logical.  OK Maybe that's a bit extreme but there are perfectly good low cost or free WYSIWYG web page editors - try First Page 2000  The majority of kids now have access to a home computer - wouldn't it be better if they could use the same software at home?  If you really want a tool as complex and powerful as Dreamweaver what about open source NVU?

Rob Hindle