At first, it seemed like Adobe makes several programs that do the same thing. But after a bit of research, I found out that they do have target audiences. I hope this guide helps people who are confused.
Dreamweaver vs Contribute.
If you want to build a website, get Dreamweaver. Contribute is designed for people who want to edit their Dreamweaver-built site, and is designed with collaboration in mind, because it edits right off the server.
Personally, I think Contribute is a big-ridden piece of garbage, if it were me, I would stick to Dreamweaver
Photoshop vs Fireworks.
Don't think of Fireworks as a stripped down version of Photoshop. Think of it as a really-really-really-really stripped down version of Flash, smashed together with CorelDRAW. Fireworks was meant to be used to make things like rollover icons, menus, and such for websites. It lets you drag-and-drop squares and circles. Pretty simple
Photoshop, on the other hand, is a powerful, expensive, image editor. Unlike Fireworks, you cannot add any dynamic-ness (word?) to images.
InDesign vs Illustrator.
InDesign is definitely more powerful than Illustrator. If you are just making simple one-page documents, ID might be a bit of an overkill.
Bridge vs Finder
Bridge is worthless. I can't see what it does that Finder doesn't.
Please correct any errors I may have made, as this is just from what I can tell. Hope this helps you with your purchase of overpriced Adobe software.
Dreamweaver vs Contribute.
If you want to build a website, get Dreamweaver. Contribute is designed for people who want to edit their Dreamweaver-built site, and is designed with collaboration in mind, because it edits right off the server.
Personally, I think Contribute is a big-ridden piece of garbage, if it were me, I would stick to Dreamweaver
Photoshop vs Fireworks.
Don't think of Fireworks as a stripped down version of Photoshop. Think of it as a really-really-really-really stripped down version of Flash, smashed together with CorelDRAW. Fireworks was meant to be used to make things like rollover icons, menus, and such for websites. It lets you drag-and-drop squares and circles. Pretty simple
Photoshop, on the other hand, is a powerful, expensive, image editor. Unlike Fireworks, you cannot add any dynamic-ness (word?) to images.
InDesign vs Illustrator.
InDesign is definitely more powerful than Illustrator. If you are just making simple one-page documents, ID might be a bit of an overkill.
Bridge vs Finder
Bridge is worthless. I can't see what it does that Finder doesn't.
Please correct any errors I may have made, as this is just from what I can tell. Hope this helps you with your purchase of overpriced Adobe software.