Introduction

Welcome to this product comparison video overview showing the differences between the latest Web design tools available from Microsoft and Macromedia, namely Microsoft’s Visual Studio 2005 and Macromedia’s Dreamweaver Version 8. Documenting code is important, not only to the coder but also to the team and those that follow. In this video, we’ll examine ways to apply notes and comments to code without exposing those comments as a part of a final Web page that gets deployed. An example would be noting things to do that need future work. Both Visual Studio 2005 and Dreamweaver 8 provide features which assist in these tasks.

Dreamweaver Section

Starting with Dreamweaver, it incorporates a feature called Design Notes which is found in the file menu. Design Notes are notes that describe an HTML or source code file and are stored in a separate file of their own. For this reason, there is no risk that an end user could discover these comments in the final rendered Web pages. You could use Design Notes to keep track of extra file information associated with your documents, such as image source file names and comments on file status as well as developer notes and reminders.

Visual Studio 2005 Section

Visual Studio 2005 incorporates notes directly into the source code page. The Task List displays comments embedded in your project code that begin with the comment marker for your development language, followed by a default task token such as "To Do," "Hack," or "Undone," or even a custom comment token. Task List comments can be used to indicate a variety of work to be done at the location marked, including, features to be added, problems to be corrected, classes to be implemented, place markers for error-handling code, or even reminders to check in the file. As with other task list entries, you can double-click and comment entry to display the file indicated in the code editor and jump immediately to the line of code in question. To place these kinds of comments inside an ASP.NET Web page or a user control file, you need to use these server side script tags. Unlike normal HTML or JavaScript comments, these blocks have the advantage of not being rendered to the end user.

Conclusion

This concludes our comparison of Dreamweaver and Visual Studio 2005 in the IDE for design notes and tasks.