Subscription Costs

[Orchids-World]

When I subscribed Dreamweaver a year ago, the subscription was around $22.00, it increased to around $26.00 and now gain it is going to increase to over $28.00. For me, with exchange rates added, it will cost over $30.00 every month.

That sounds good if you use Dreamweaver every day, but I only use the application for about 20 minutes a month. Taking into account that I am just a pensioner with no regular income other then my pension and my website "Orchids-World.com" is Non Profit Site, I believe it is a bit too much.

I could use another similar program; however, I am using Dreamweaver for over 15 years and I am used to it. Maybe I maintain bad habits of yesteryear, but I think Adobe could easily effort to maintain a reasonable price for aged people like myself. It is sad to think, that due to lack of options, I have no choice but to look for alternatives.

It is sad.

George

[Nancy OShea · Accepted solution]

Download Brackets.  It's free.  And the code engine is the very same one Dreamweaver uses.  You will need to get an FTP extension for Brackets if you don't already have Filezilla or Cute FTP client.

Brackets - A modern, open source code editor that understands web design.

eqFTP

Nancy

[Orchids-World]

Thanks. The use of only "code" will be difficult for me, sometimes I would like to see the "results" of my coding (WYSIWYG editor). With Adobe, I even pay for "Cloud space" use although I do not use anything. Anyway, I will download and try out Brackets. It could be just what I need. Thank again.

[Nancy OShea]

Orchids-World  wrote

Thanks. The use of only "code" will be difficult for me, sometimes I would like to see the "results" of my coding (WYSIWYG editor).

In Brackets, use Preview with Chrome browser to see your work in real-time.

Nancy   

[Orchids-World]

I downloaded and installed Brackets. Is the app an Adobe app?  If not, why Adobe receives automatically info about how I use Brackets and what I am doing with it? Why it works only with Chrome? Is the app made for Android OS? I use EDGE and Firefox. I find Google apps very intrusive.

[Nancy OShea]

Adobe developed Brackets as a beta project. That''s why it's open source.   It gathers Crash logs and sends data to developers so they can work on bugs.  This is nothing new.  Windows, the various browsers and Creative Cloud apps all do it too.   It's not a concern to me.  But I think you can opt out from it in your settings.

Brackets is available for Win, Mac or Linux.  I don't think there is an Android version.

Brackets Preview launches Chrome browser.  No doubt for the same reasons that the current DW uses a Chrome rendering engine for Live View.  But you can copy the URL from Chrome into any other browser if desired. 

Nancy

[Orchids-World]

Thanks, I am trying it although I am not quite sure I can use it successfully.

[osgood_]

Orchids-World  wrote

Thanks. The use of only "code" will be difficult for me, sometimes I would like to see the "results" of my coding (WYSIWYG editor). With Adobe, I even pay for "Cloud space" use although I do not use anything. Anyway, I will download and try out Brackets. It could be just what I need. Thank again.

Brackets wont be any use to you if you need a visual editor. It might be ok if you only intend to update a limited amount of content and don't mind doing this while in code view. Brackets is an editor aimed more at the coder.

[Orchids-World]

I am not useless, but at the same time, because I only use it a very limited time every month, I do lack in confidence. Sometimes, mistakes can be very difficult to "repair". I would like to have both options, that's why I use Dreamweaver. I can change things using code and view things before posting to make sure I did not do any mistakes. It is sad I can not buy outright the product anymore. There are hundreds for Adobe "packages" available on the market for very little money but all are for students. The fact is, the students of today have more money than the pensioners. Adobe doesn't take this into account when pricing.

[rayek.elfin]

Another alternative: Pinegrow with Atom. Atom is free (Atom​​) and Pinegrow (https://pinegrow.com/ ) is either $80 for a perpetual license with 1 year of free updates, or $8 a month (subscription). Pinegrow is easy visual editing, while Atom integrates seamlessly for code editing - change the code, and Pinegrow updates the visual view automatically (while you type). Edit in the visual view of Pinegrow, and the code adjusts with it.

Version 3 is going to be very interesting - in my opinion Pinegrow is the direction that Dreamweaver would have taken in a better alternate universe.

[Orchids-World]

Thanks, I will have a look at it and try it out. There used to be so many Software, even Microsoft used to have a reasonably good one in the 80's.

[W_J_T]

rayek.elfin  wrote

Another alternative: Pinegrow with Atom. Version 3 is going to be very interesting - in my opinion Pinegrow is the direction that Dreamweaver would have taken in a better alternate universe.

Pinegrow 4 , just released today.

* They changed their version numbering system, so this is the continuation of the Version 3 release going forward.

Introduction to Pinegrow 4 - YouTube

[creativedigitalnz]

I have to say, I was disappointed to receive another price increase email here in New Zealand. Adobe is the only cloud subscription that seems to increase on a regular basis. If this keeps up I will start looking for alternatives.

[pziecina]

As a fellow pensioner, I agree that a subscription is very expensive, and would like to see Adobe, (and every one else) offer us a least the student rate. The trouble is I do not think it is going to happen.

If you do your site using code then a free alternative such as Brackets, (Nancy's suggestion) would be a very good alternative, as with a few extensions it would be just as good as Dreamweaver for you.

The question I would ask you though, is what else do you wish to do?

As an example if you wish to learn more about what one can now do using css and html5, then surprisingly the suggestion of Atom by 'rayek' is at the moment better than Brackets, (or Dreamweaver). Another alternative would be visual studio code -

https://code.visualstudio.com/

[osgood_]

Pinegrow/Atom, et al - I'm dust.

More time to enjoy the wine and the sun.

[pziecina]

osgood_  wrote

More time to enjoy the wine and the sun.

once you become a pensioner, you look at any complaints from others as being irrelevant, (almost better than the wine and sun).

[osgood_]

pziecina  wrote

osgood_   wrote

More time to enjoy the wine and the sun.

once you become a pensioner, you look at any complaints from others as being irrelevant, (almost better than the wine and sun).

Yeah, more interested in the zimmer frame and out-patient department being in good working order.

[pziecina]

Believe me, there are many more positives to being a pensioner, than there are negatives.

[osgood_]

pziecina  wrote

Believe me, there are many more positives to being a pensioner, than there are negatives.

Free false teeth and hearing aid are 2 of them.

[I_Hate_Subscriptions]

Unfortunately, Adobe has moved away from servicing the small guy (individual, small business, etc). Subscriptions make sense to large business, but make no sense to those that don't have a lot of money to burn.

Subscription locks you in... if I can't afford to make a monthly payment (medical bills, unexpected circumstances, higher business priorities), then I lose my ability to use the software.

Adobe Subscription is probably the right call if you own a large business -- and if that's the audience Adobe wants to target.

But it forces the smaller guy to look for alternative software programs. I have  been encouraging my three college kids to stay away from subscription-based services.

The model works for large businesses that require being kept up-to-date, but most individuals/families/students/small business do not have a need to receive every little update.

Besides, other software companies often provide free updates to customers within a certain time-frame after purchase. Adobe does not.

[Nancy OShea]

i_hate_subscriptions  wrote

other software companies often provide free updates to customers within a certain time-frame after purchase. Adobe does not.

Untrue.  Adobe gives Creative Cloud members FREE updates & upgrades for as long as we remain members.  And we have access to older product versions if we need them for legacy projects.  IMO, the subscription model is far superior, more affordable and covers a much wider range of products than the old perpetual licensing system did.   YMMV.

[osgood_]

Not that you actually pay for Adobe software being an ACP so its a bit rich to comment.

[Nancy OShea]

Excuse me.  I joined Creative Cloud in 2012 and paid monthly up until I was invited to join the ACP program.   Before that I had purchased many hundreds of dollars worth of perpetually licensed versions. So I can say with some authority that the Creative Cloud Plan is a better value than the old system was.

Nancy

[osgood_]

Sorry but as you have free access you dont understand that there are a  lot of people with limited funds and ideally for them an outright purchase is a somewhat better deal for them in the long run, which l do understand.

The whole idea of subscription based software is to stop buyers not updating for several years. I was using cs4 up until about a year ago and it wss a perfectly capable and good editor, no need for any updates for several years unless of course you want to pay for a few junk Bootstrap snippets and a pretty awful experience as even you admit cs2018 is.

As it was l grew discontented with Dw and bought into a bit of software which wipes the floor with it for l think 70 quid a year which will decrease for the second and third year........go figure.

[Nancy OShea]

I do understand as I'm not made of money either.  Assuming I did not have access to it, I would go back to paying for it.   I must have PS, AI, Acrobat Pro, ID, DW and other apps to do my work.  Simple as that.