In the other half of the Export Preview dialog box is a large, live preview area, along with navigation aids and VCR-style animation playback controls. Here you can choose to split the preview area into two or four frames, and select different settings for each frame so you can compare the results. Slicing and dicing Some of Fireworks' advanced features more than compensate for the inconveniences of the interface, however. When exporting, Fireworks automatically divides the button areas into individual image files and generates the HTML code required to reassemble the files in a browser. Fireworks supports behavior assignment and, on export, automatically generates any JavaScript code associated with those behaviors.
Animations are relatively straightforward to create.
To make a simple animation of same-sized images, such as ad banners, you just place each image on its own frame. To create an animation showing a movement or change in an object, however, you first need to convert the object to a symbol in the workspace, then clone it, creating an instance. You can play back the animation in the workspace or in the Export Preview dialog box. Fireworks also has good batch-processing features, so you can apply the same optimization settings to a group of files at once. Fireworks demands a minimum of 32 MB of RAM, plus more RAM if you want to use the Dreamweaver integration features and a browser for previews.