Contribute for Technophytes

What's New in Version 3 of Contribute

Faster Performance

Macromedia claims to have made performance enhancements to Contribute. Since I had not noticed any particular performance problems, I can't see a difference, but if you connect via a slower connection, this might help you.

In-Place Image Editing

You can edit photos inside web pages with new inline image editing capabilities. Crop, resize, and make minor edits using built-in Macromedia Fireworks technology.

Note: to edit an image within Contribute 3, the image must first be saved to your website! Add the image to your page, publish the page, and then proceed to editing the image.

To edit an image:

1. Click the image to select it. When you do, a tool bar will appear near the top of your Contribute editing window:
   
2. From the left, you have six tools: resize, rotate counter-clockwise, rotate clockwise, crop, sharpen, and brightness/contrast. You can also change the width and height (in pixels) by typing in new values in the appropriate fields. Use Contribute's help to find step-wise instructions for editing images.

You can also double-click the image to bring up a dialog box with more options or right-click (Windows) or control-click (Macintosh) to bring up a menu of options.

Insert Standard Video Files Directly into Web Pages

Embed video files into a web page rather than link to them.

To embed a video:

1. From the menu bar, choose "Insert"
2. From the insert menu, choose "Movie"
3. Choose between "From my computer" and "From website" depending upon where the video is.
4. Browse to the file
5. Click the file to choose it
6. Click "OK"
7. To change properties of the movie, double-click on it. You should uncheck the option "Start playing movie when page loads" but be sure to leave "Show movie controls" checked.

For more feature descriptions, check out the Macromedia Contribute Upgrade webpage at: http://www.macromedia.com/software/contribute/productinfo/upgrade/index.html