whats the point of using template?

Question

I am under the impression that if I set it as a template in Dreamweaver, any changes made should be saved to a new filename. I've copied the "template" that I made and sometimes I forget to save it as a different file name and it would overwrite previous web content. I just don't get the point of "save as template" if it works just like a document... it doesn't force me to save as a different filename. Common sense in me thinks that the software should evaluate like this, "if this is a template, always save as a different filename when it's modified so nothing is changed to the template, but rather a new file is created with the new content following that template."

Am I missing something? Am I always doomed to using Save As...?

Answer 1

Here is a nice article by Mark Fletcher: Consistent Web Design with Dreamweaver Templates

Briefly, if you have a lot of same pages but with different content, like photgallery, simple paragraphs, login forms etc. you can define a template and create documents based on this template. Also, you will have to define editable and "not editable" regions of template. And when you will create several documents based on this template, and you will need to change something in the header, you will have to change it only in template file and then, this change will apply to all child documents. (But only if changes was made to "not editable" region).

Its almost the same as template logic of PHP sites.