Design Time Style Sheets for Contribute or Dreamweaver

This project teaches you how to link style sheets to templates, how to manipulate these style sheets using a Template Optional Region (non-editable) and its associated Template parameter.

This in-depth 18 page tutorial has a set of finished files that you can preview if you get stuck with the instructions. The finished template is in the Templates folder and named: tut3-dtcss-finished.dwt, its dependant file (instance or child) is in the root folder and named: index-finished.htm. Feel free to view these files at your leisure.

Although CSS support in both Macromedia Dreamweaver MX 2004 and Macromedia Contribute 2.0 has improved, there are still quite a few CSS-P bugs related to Design view and commands (Macromedia Dreamweaver and/or Macromedia Contribute). A curiously absent feature of Macromedia Contribute is that it doesn't directly support Design Time Style Sheets at all, unlike Macromedia Dreamweaver MX, which does, but not as desired for these outlined issues. There are workarounds that you can use to overcome these bugs and missing features, one of which is to employ Design Time Style Sheets (DTCSS), which empower your content editors with the full functionality of either product, as long as you have created the Style Sheets properly.