Why did I make this website?

I love Dreamweaver
I have been using Dreamweaver (Dw) since version 3, and feel there is no better web design application available today. My hope is to give back to the program that has given so much to me. 

Testing WordPress 123
I wanted to test out the features and installation of WordPress. I have deployed it in customer websites a couple of times, but have never really managed one from the users point of view. It probably the greatest template driven CMS web applications available (I have only used WordPress so cannot compare to others, but I have heard from many that this is a valid statement). So lets see how far we can push this open source web application.

Teaching Dreamweaver
I have been teaching Dreamweaver (Dw) for a little over 5 years now, and I have noticed that some bugs remain in version after version of Dw (I just took a look at the beta CS4, and many of the bugs still exist). While a lot of these bugs have workarounds, I have witnessed many bewildered students when the application does not perform as one would expect, or as the Dw developers intended. After 1-2 years of teaching Web Design I stopped defending Dw, and simply state its a bug in the program. As a result, students are left to feel Dreamweaver is not as great as expected, making it a harder sell in my classes (why are we using this as opposed to xyz?).

Why should I be in charge of such a task?
I am in a great position to test and provide feedback to the developers of Dreamweaver. I not only experience bugs, but I witness my students experience the same issues, and more. Many cases are reproduced over and over again on multiple machines, which helps me see if it is a consistent obstacle. Unfortunately (and fortunately) this is only on the Macintosh side of things, but its a good start. I am also considering setting up a windows machine to see if these bugs persist in that environment as well, however this is not very cost effective. Whattya say Adobe, can you give me a Windows version of Dreamweaver for testing purposes? I already own VMWare Fusion and Windows XP Home to test websites in IE 6.5. I imagine its cheaper than hiring me as a Dreamweaver Tester, so I think the compensation would be more than fair.

Adobe Bug Reporting and Forums
The current set up for Adobe feedback feels overwhelming and inaccessible to the community. When I send bug reports through their web form it feels like it simply goes into the abyss of emails that I am sure Adobe receives on a daily basis.

The bug report forum seems to be new, or missing a Dreamweaver thread. Not to mention, it feels like there are too many hoops to contribute or access these reports. Unless I am missing something, perhaps someone knows of a step by step that makes contributing to the Adobe bug forum easier, please let me know. The following image is the only bug forums that I found in Adobe’s Site, and I could not find a way to start a new project. Must need God Admin privs or something.

Involve the Dw Community
My hope is to put the microphone into the community’s hands so that we can open a dialog with the Developers of Adobe Dreamweaver.

I have searched high and low for a site that offers something similar to contribute to, and have yet to find one. If someone knows of any, please send me the link. Collaboration is key.

This site will also keeps an open record for anyone who is searching for known issues with Dreamweaver, and consolidates them all into one place. I do not know how many times I have found a bug and did a Google search only to find that no one else has published this problem. 

As a starting point I will focus on the Dw Macintosh, but hope to configure WordPress to allow the community to contribute errors as well. Not sure how this will work yet, so please be patient while I get to know WordPress a little better. In the meantime, please feel free to send me an email (HTML emails with screen grabs would be helpful) in regards to any bugs or feature requests for Dreamweaver. Or, if you like, you can post your request here.

All in all, I hope this will help us all build a better Dreamweaver,
Mitchell Gohman