Macromedia has announced a major upgrade to Macromedia Contribute, redefining Web publishing by enabling nontechnical users to update pages on Web sites or intranets as easily as they would edit a Microsoft Word document.

Macromedia Contribute 3 adds granular administrator control, flexible approval workflow, editing enhancements, and Dreamweaver MX 2004 integration to its ease-of-use and browse-edit-publish workflow. It is a key element of the new, enterprise-ready Macromedia Web Publishing System for organizational deployments to hundreds or thousands of business users. For more information, or to download a preview release of Macromedia Contribute 3, visit http://www.macromedia.com/go/contribute3/.

Contribute has already unlocked the power of web publishing for more than 200,000 individuals. A broad spectrum of users, including teachers, students, government employees, project managers, sales and marketing professionals, administrative assistants, intranet administrators, and small business owners, depend on Contribute to publish their own sites for small businesses, maintain departmental intranets, and edit corporate Web sites. Unlike traditional Web content management systems, Contribute 3 does not require complicated workflow definitions, and is able to edit existing HTML Web sites. Site administrators simply define which users have publishing permission and those who can only edit and send pages for review, giving significantly more control to administrators and Web developers.

New features for content contributors include increased performance, support for editing a wider range of Web sites, integrated image editing, Microsoft Office integration, and automatic electronic document publishing in PDF and Flash file formats via FlashPaper 2. For Web designers and developers, Contribute 3 adds WebDAV support and incorporates the engine for Cascading Style Sheet (CSS) rendering from Dreamweaver MX 2004 to allow powerful, standards-based control of Web page layout and styling. A new external editing feature enables technical review and editing of Web page source code in an external HTML editor (such as Dreamweaver) before publishing.

Upgrades to Contribute 3 will include a single user access license to Contribute Publishing Services, a new server component that is included with the Macromedia Web Publishing System. Contribute Publishing Services is lightweight and installs in minutes on Windows, Linux, and Unix servers; or deployed to standard J2EE application environments.

Pricing and Availability

A preview release of Macromedia Contribute 3 is available at http://www.macromedia.com/go/contribute3/. The produce is expected to ship for Windows and Mac OS X in English worldwide in August. Pricing is $79 for upgrades, $149 for new users, and $699 for a Contribute six-pack. Volume discounts and government and education licensing are available. Localized versions for French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, and Spanish are planned for later this year.