Microsoft Expression Web

Designers now have a tool that lets users create modern CSS and XML-based Web pages without fuss and produces efficient, universally compatible code with minimal effort. Nothing else matches Microsoft Expression Web’s standards based approach or so easily lets you build Web pages that display data from XML files.

At first glance, the software looks like the late, lamented Front Page 2003. It uses a similar menu structure and choice of relatively WYSIWYG views: design, pure-code, and code on top with the visual design below. FrontPage features that create standards-based code for any browser and Web server still work. New task panes and toolbars let you build and edit CSS styles and give point-and-click control over XML data sources.

The master page helps you easily create a consistent site. Fashioning dynamic data views requires almost no effort, and if you know CSS basics, a simple right-click on an element lets you control formatting of a data view. You won’t yet find the range of add-ins available for Adobe Dreamweaver, though.

Microsoft Expression Web lacks Secure FTP file-transfer support for publishing sites to the Web, but that’s a relatively minor complaint about an otherwise elegant and efficient application. I strongly recommend it to anyone building Web pages. That said, stay tuned for my review of Dreamweaver’s CS3 edition.