Dreamweaver, iweb, Wordpress,

Choice of a particular web design package is most affected by your experience and how much time you want to spend learning a new language or system.

For most people, wordpress is the answer because it allows putting up a blog-style web site quickly, easily and without a lot of learning curve. There are a huge number of optional bits available, and so many themes you could spend weeks deciding on which one you want to use.

When I started developing web sites, I used a text editor and wrote html code from scratch. As I got into database oriented sites, I used Microsoft Visual Interdev, which was great for professional developers but more than pricey for the casual user. Perl and PHP languages were handy for a lot of side tasks along the way.

There are a number of WSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) web editor/designers out there, and some of them are pretty good, but without knowing your experience level and long term plan.

Today, half of my sites run Wordpress because it is fast to do what I need. I still write pages in html, perl and PHP as the need strikes, but mostly because I'm familiar with them from years past. Most of the ones that aren't using wordpress are older sites that haven't been through a rebuild in the past year or so.

For someone new, I'd suggest taking a look at wordpress, because it is easy to understand, and pretty versatile. There are a lot of "how to" videos out there to help you along if you get stuck, or just want a bit of help.

I use AdobePhotoshop and Dreamweaver. Also I work with different CMSs and shopping carts|(WordPress, Joomla,Drupal, Magento, PrestaShop, VirtueMart and HikaShop(ecommerce extensions for Joomla), TomatoCart, Zen Cart, osCommerce, etc).

Depends what you want to do. If its just HTML/CSS, then dreamweaver is good (using the code editor rather than the drag and drop thingy). You will also need something to do your images in, and I prefer photoshop for this.
If you are looking to write code, be it PHP, or .Net, then you will need a decent development environment. Would recommend Eclipse for PHP, and I think you can get a cut down version of visual studio from Microsoft Web Platform - Start building better Web sites for free if you fancy writing .Net code.

I used to hard code just using Notepad++ then switched to Dreamweaver because it was faster. Didn't use the wysiwyg, though. Now I just use Wordpress because I can put up sites so darn fast with it.

Find out what is fast and easy for YOU and use it. It really doesn't matter what anyone else is doing.

Dreamweaver is great! I am using it!

Wordpress for me. So easy to use!

Dreamweaver & Wordpress for all web development.
Photoshop & Fireworks for all graphics.

Wordpress, free and easy to install

Dreamweaver, Wordpress and XSite Pro. That's it. Everything you need is there.

I use WordPress all day.

It's easy, It works...

Nothing else is needed.

wordpress and dreamweaver, I outsource the rest. I was first amazed when I did this, there are some real wizards out there that use these programs.

Dreamweaver cs5, by far the best out there

Thanks all for the comments and the question as it is one of mine. I was leaning strongly toward Wordpress to begin with and your thoughts have helped me to decide on wordpress for my first adventure in page building.

I notice there is wordpress.org and wordpress.com. Any opinions on which is better?

I use Fireworks to build my mock ups, then I slice them and take them to Dreamweaver. I also use Fireworks for my headers, graphics, etc.

BUT I also use wordpress, and artisteer to build custom themes. I'm still learning wordpress, and I hope to eventually be able to go from Dreamweaver to Wordoress, but that may take time.

I use both wordpress and good ol' XHTML/CSS custom designs, depending on my needs.

Self hosted wordpress blogs can't be beat for what you can do with them, but keep in mind that all of the plugins/theme and the size of your database can quickly eat up resources, especially for shared hosting. Wordpress isn't the most efficient solution when you have a site with alot of traffic.

Regardless if you decide to use a CMS like wordpress or go with your own designs and use something like Dreamweaver, it is still helpful to know HTML and how to build things by hand.

Go a step further and learn PHP and you can build custom applications to accomplish anything you need to do. Good luck!

I use wordpress for many reasons
1. Google LOVES wordpress & blog type sites
2. The structure is already pre-built very SEO Friendly
3. EASY to build/set up sites very quickly
4. Plenty of SEO/IM Plug-ins that can automate SEO and make the entire process easier.

My vote goes to WP

When I start IM, Dreamweaver was my favorite. But now I only work with Wordpress to create MNS. Sometimes I hire a mini site designer for ecommerce web sites. Because I can't spend time with designing web sites.

It depends on the niche I'm into... for some niches wordpress is spectacular especially if you need to add constant content some plugins are just life savers.

But for other niches I go for Xsite Pro, easy to use and with many resources as well. Great to build and forget and without having too many SQL databases that pissed off some hostings.

Well... comparing Dreamweaver to WordPress is apples to oranges.

Dreamweaver is for both web design and web application development.

WordPress is a blogging platform that is able to have features added via the plugin system.

But WordPress itself is neither a design tool nor a tool for actually building web applications. Although I guess you would say it is becoming more of a framework...thus somewhat of a tool.

But they really can not be compared to one another because they are not even close to the same thing.

For instance developing a blogging platform from scratch (like WordPress) can be done in Dreamweaver. Since that would be considered developing a web application. Although you would be smart to not just rely on the code creation in Dreamweaver for all your functionality since the code would be rather bloated.

Since your asking the question the way you did. I would say that WordPress is probably more of what you are looking for to just get sites up and online fast.

I prefer to use Wordpress.

Wordpress is the answer for me. But you really need to establish exactly what you want the website to do for you. Create your needs list, and compare what is available. Joomla, dreamweaver and html are the other options, may be for a company. But if you want a personal website, start with wordpress, I believe it will work for you.