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JULY 16, 2002 Macromedia Fireworks MX
The major features From the beginning, there were two features in Fireworks that made me love the program. Since I work on the Web every single day, the first feature is the program's ability to crunch bitmap images into tiny, little JPEGs while retaining an amazing degree of quality. I don't care what program you put Fireworks up against, its ability to compress JPEGs is unparalleled. The result is smaller file sizes and higher-quality images than what you get out of other applications. Period. [an error occurred while processing this directive] As a little added bonus, you can also do selective quality settings quite simply. Just select an area of your canvas, turn on the "Selective Quality" option, and you're done. 
The second feature that has continued to draw me to Fireworks is its ability to apply filters non-destructively. This includes Photoshop filters. What I mean by this is that Fireworks can apply otherwise destructive effects (such as blurs or third-party filters like Alien Skin Splat!) in a non-destructive way. You can apply the effects in any order and remove them as you see fit, just as you can with Photoshop's Layer Styles--except that with Fireworks we're talking about full-fledged filter effects, not just styles. 
Now, as you know, I review everything on Mac OS X. And in this particular case, the transition to OS X has not been a smooth one for Macromedia. Not all Carbonized versions of the Photoshop filters work with Fireworks, and certainly not all of them work as non-destructive effects. Color Theory Pro, for example, does not work properly at all. But, as I mentioned, Alien Skin filters do work, both as regular, destructive filters and as non-destructive effects. But Flaming Pear filters, while they work fine as destructive effects, do not work as editable effects. This seems likely to be a function of the new OS and will hopefully be rectified in a subsequent incremental update. 
Also on the negative side with regard to effects, the I don't like how effects are organized in Fireworks MX. Rather than appearing in a floating palette, they now appear in the Fireworks property inspector. The palette version was superior for the mere fact that it could be expanded to show all effects at the same time. But in the property inspector, you see a maximum of three effects at a time and have to use a tiny scroll bar to navigate through the rest. Definitely a step backwards in usability. 
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