June 2009 - Posts
I got my invite today for the Expression Studio v3 launch in San Francisco July 10, 2009. Yes, I will be going and intend to have laptop or at least iPhone busy during the launch presentations, maybe both. So you will be able to follow what I have to say as they are showing the new stuff on Twitter (http://twitter.com/cdwise ) and a more detailed set of impressions and info here even if it takes a little longer to get posted (but will be posted as soon as possible since I do have cellular internet in this tablet.)
I’m looking forward to seeing the what’s new and hopefully improved.
In just under a month Expression Web v3 will be coming out. I am thinking of doing an editor comparison between Expression Web 3 and Dreamweaver CS 4 once v3 is available. What I would like to know is what sort of things should I compare the two programs and whether or not I should include Expression Web v2 in the comparison.
What do you think?
Okay, I’ll admit it when I own/moderate a web group I enforce the list rules. I’ve been on too many lists where there was no List Mom and ended up being filled with spam or dreck. If this makes me “arrogant” then so be it.
That means if you post a question to a list where I’m List Mom you need to:
- Be on topic – if you have a question not directly related to the list topic but related to web design/development in general mark it with OT so that list members are alerted to the nature of the question. Keep it relevant or it moderators will shut down the thread.
- Use a descriptive subject line – this helps ensure that you get the attention of contributors who are knowledgeable or interested about that particular area. Do use subjects such as PHP form display issue, or Content Div not displaying, or Set a default editor for images. Don’t use “Question”, “Help”, “I’m a beginner”. This is especially important on a large or high volume list.
- Trim your quotes, other than the forum here at http://by-expression.com/forms every group I moderate is an email group whether on Yahoo Groups or Google Groups. On some of these there are a substantial percentage of folks using dial-up, being charged by the byte or receiving the digest version. So we ask that people be considerate and not quote everything when they reply. In addition to removing any adverts put in by say Yahoo, trim everything except what is needed to put your reply in context.
- Be courteous, and that means to everyone including the moderators if they make suggestions on how to improve your post. Flaming is not allowed nor is trolling. Doing either will get you banned.
Lists I own/moderate include by topic:
<moderator hat>
This is a convention used on many mail lists that I first saw years ago on one of the mail lists I belong to (I think it was css-d but I really don’t remember) that is used to distinguish a post made by a list owner or official moderator to remind people of list rules OR to call a halt to a thread that has drifted too far off topic or become abusive.
The use of this tag is meant to be a more or less gentle reminder that the list is moderated and keep the list on topic. The alternative is to either ban participants in off topic threads and/or violation of list rules, something that seems to harsh or go to a list that is a free for all. Neither of which would be good for any list in the long run.
Looks like some information is on what is in Expression Web v3 is beginning to appear.
If you use some of the few Expression Web add-ons you may not want to upgrade to Expression Web v3 when it comes out according to Steve Guttman as quoted in the Expression Web team blog:
This means that a lot of things that worked before won’t work under the new unified UI framework, this can affect quite a few things when the coding of the program itself has to be changed. As Steve states at the end of his comment not everything will be ported into Expression Web 3.0 for this version. It also certainly means that none of the current Expression Web addons will work in EW 3.0 either.
So to my mind, if you like the CURRENT features of Expression Web 2.0 you should upgrade NOW. Since the SuperPreview will also be available as a standalone FREE version, you won’t be missing out on that particular new feature. http://www.expression-web.net/expression-web-3-insights/
So the question becomes will you gain more than you lose with the move to a “unified UI framework”?
Other links regarding Expression Studio v3 you might be interested in:
If you use Team Foundation Server here is what you will need to do to have it work with Expression Studio v3 http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/KB967483 Does this mean that you will now be able to have versioning and check-in/check-out for those working in teams with Visual Studio users?
Silverlight tools and debugging in Expression Web http://team.silverlight.net/announcements/expression-web-3-tools-simplify-debugging-and-silverlight-video-encoding/
Wonder what else we will find out before the July 10, 2009 release date?
Somasegar posted on his blog today some of the new things in EW v3. He's got more on the version of SuperPreview that will be in EW v3, sftp/ftps, something called "snapshot preview", Silverlight video and Photoshop integration see: http://blogs.msdn.com/somasegar/archive/2009/06/05/expression-web-3.aspx
Browser testing – BrowserLab from Adobe vs SuperPreview from Microsoft.
Today Adobe released their beta of BrowserLab which lets you preview a wider variety of browsers than the current beta version of SuperPreview (small images are linked to full size ones):
Previews are generated via a service which means you can preview on different operating system
- Firefox 2.0 – Windows XP
- Firefox 3.0 – Windows XP
- IE 6 – Windows XP
- IE 7 – Windows XP
- Safari – OS X
- Firefox 2.0 – OS X
- Firefox 3.0 – OS X
The benefit of using a service like BrowserLab over a locally run instance like SuperPreview does is that you can also see the color differences between OS X and Windows. Enlarge the image on the left and you will see significant differences in how the colors render.
The colors in IE 6 on Windows XP appear very washed out compared to Safari on OS X.
Both BrowserLabs and SuperPreview offer an overlay mode that lets you see how positioning maybe different between each of the browsers you are testing.
Looking at IE 6 (XP) and Safari (OS X) shows you just how quirky IE 6 can be.
What I would really like to see is the ability to test out more than a static browser view. See how rollovers work (or not). It will be interesting to see how these tools develop.