Over the years, I’ve used many different development tools and have tried many others. While hand coding is gratifying, when developing sites that need to get done quickly I’ve settled on Dreamweaver CC.
In the early beginning of Dreamweaver, yes the code was messy and bloated and it was better just to hand code stuff primitive as it was. The newest versions out now will produce the exact same code you would if you hand coded it. I also like the way I can select my code colors to separate out the different types of coding on the page not to mention the ability to see the fluid layouts for responsive modes.
I know die hard hand coders hate programs like that, but when you’re in business charging rates that are very competitive, why hand code something that takes 5 minutes, when the EXACT same output can be produced with a few clicks. Over the course of the day, that can amount to a lot of billable time.
Granted, the ability to hand code is a necessity so you can go in and tweak the things you want to, and not knowing how to code will limit you on taking advantage of the full potential of what web sites can do today.
Of course, I still hand code the PHP, Java, etc, with the pages, but the ability to save snippets of code and apply that code with a click has really saved me a lot of time in developing sites and delivering them to clients quickly.
You’ll find forums all over the Internet talking about what is better than the other, but every programmer has their preferred tools and it boils down to what works best for them.
