bwpdsigns.com

Being a dabbler the art of server side scripting I’ve had a lot of interest in learning and developing my PHP skills (and other server side languages). In a pinch I’ve been toying with Dreamweaver to handle a few things such as database connections, inserts, updates and a few other things for dynamic pages. This started because of the time constraints involved with getting the project together I didn’t have time to search out the syntax in PHP to handle this or that. What I’ve found is that Dreamweaver actually has a pretty good amount the common tasks in getting a simple application together then I realized. Which bring up the question..
Should I let Dreamweaver write PHP Code?
I’m thinking in the end, it’s a pretty scary concept letting any library, framework or application write code. The idea of letting that level of control out of your hands as a developer is actually a bit threatening and dangerous. Dangerous because if it breaks, it’s just that much more difficult to troubleshoot. Threatening because if anyone with a copy of said application can use a few simple interfaces to accomplish something then it’s a job security issue. So should I let Dreamweaver write code for me? Of course. Depending on the situation. Also I can’t imagine my code as a novice PHP developer will be better then Dreamweaver’s.
In the End
Ultimately Dreamweaver is a tool, and tools help you get the work done quicker, better and more efficiently. It’s also a powerful tool that has capabilities that aren’t always utilized, such as the ones I used to write a simple yet effective content management interface for a project I’m working on in roughly 2-3 hours.
For those Interested
Here’s what I did along with a couple of the code bits that I used in Dreamweaver.
I build a simple form based system to input data about a product including:
Title, Description, Price, Type, Path to the Photo
I used DW to build user authentication against a database the verifies you’re logged in for each of my “admin” pages. Also used it to log out a user.
I used the repeating data to have a viewing page for that listed all the products entered.
I used it to develop the front end system for the site also. (Very simplified).
I note this because in 2-3 hours I was able to build a few things that would have taken several hours to implement by hand and by having to reference syntax.
The other benefit to getting this to work in DW is that you have code written for certain tasks then you can review the code to help your learning process.
All in all I’m very happy with it but I still have concerns with how secure the code is, but I’ll fall back to the fact that I’m sure a team of developers writing code to include in DW are much more qualified then I am.
The Moral of the Story
Don’t forget to use those less utilized tools that you have access too. Many times there are plenty of time saving utilities that can free up time to concentrate on other parts of the project.

After watching someone try to use the portfolio section of my site I found several things that were in serious need of fixing. Okay truth be told, I knew they were broken. Being that I don’t tend to put enough effort into this site things tend to stay broken. That’s going to change.
Being that this is basically the only site I have to show related to my design skills I need to kick it up a notch. So what do I do? I update the portfolio with a very non – design update.
The portfolio now has a back and next feature. Also in this update the thumbnails now actually change the preview image. Sadly no new content has been added, sorting is still yet to be implemented and the descriptions for each project are terrible.
Here’s one thing that you may not realize about the portfolio section. While it’s design isn’t the greatest and the programming isn’t anything special. There’s one very cool thing going on. The secret. The XML that’s driving the portfolio on bwpdsigns.com is also driving the Flash based portfolio site bryanpaulus.com. Both the HTML version and the Flash version are using the same XML and the same Images. Impressed? No? You guys are brutal.
Basically the reason I’m talking this up is because I believe it’s a great use of technology. (I’m proud of myself). This is the way the web is moving (or should be) and the way designers and developers should be thinking. Ever hear of web standards? Multiple CSS files completely redesigning a single HTML file. **cough** zengarden **cough** Exactly the same idea. Keep your content separate from your visual display and you can reuse the content in any visual format you need.
My message to anyone that reads this. Make smart use of the technologies available. Take a step back and look at the big picture. How can I organize this so that I can make updates quick and easy? How can I build this so that when I need to do a redesign I can salvage as much content as possible?
This comes up time and time again in almost every project I’ve ever been a part of. What can we reuse from the existing site? Is the code reusable? Is the CSS reusable? Is the HTML so table dependent that we need to start over from scratch? Hopefully if you plan well you’ll be able to answer yes to all these questions and more.
Later

ASP.NET 2.0, PHP, Coldfusion, C#, VBscript.NET, so many to choose from. How does someone choose what to learn and what to dismiss? I don’t really use any of them at work currently, I could justify Coldfusion for my freelance work, I could justify just about any of them because there’s a market for it. IBasically I’m learning quickly that spreading your knowledge too thin just basically means that while you know a little of everything you never really know a lot of one thing.
More on this later