[Don Pickett]

A lot of people seem to forget that Adobe's reputation isn't exactly spotless. It's been since Illustrator 5 since they released an upgrade without major issues - usually with color.

A lot of places wait a full year until upgrading to the next full release, and the place I'm working at now will only let the production people use Illustrator 9. Art and Design are still on 8. 9's transparency features are usless in real life (try and make a PDF with Illustrator transparency) and graphs made with Illustrator still corrput after being edited too many times.

People may hate Quark the company, but Adobe is barely any better.

[suhail]

chris v thanx for the tip, I found a site that has the XT, heven't tried it yet. The site says that it forces Quark into a screen re-draw when switching apps. That shouldn't solve the scrolling with the Hand-Tool nor the Spell checking long documents issues. Maybe it does, I'll try it later.
http://www.automatrix.co.uk/products/~ClassicDrawXT/

Wether we design in Quark, InDesign, or any other app. We mostly supply PDFs. And InDesign does this automatically without distiller

If you've been using Quark all your career, give InDesign a try. It has awesome features that Quark only dreams of. But try InDesign on a brochure that requires heavy graphics and NOT, I repeat, NOT a catalog or any document that is more that 4 pages long.

The major problem with InDesign is speed otherwise it's great

[suhail]

Originally posted by Don Pickett:
A lot of people seem to forget that Adobe's reputation isn't exactly spotless. It's been since Illustrator 5 since they released an upgrade without major issues - usually with color.

A lot of places wait a full year until upgrading to the next full release, and the place I'm working at now will only let the production people use Illustrator 9. Art and Design are still on 8. 9's transparency features are usless in real life (try and make a PDF with Illustrator transparency) and graphs made with Illustrator still corrput after being edited too many times.

People may hate Quark the company, but Adobe is barely any better.

You should try 10's transparency.
Here is a test I did, just for you
http://www.wmminc.com/TranTest.pdf

[Don Pickett]

Originally posted by suhail:
If you've been using Quark all your career, give InDesign a try. It has awesome features that Quark only dreams of. But try InDesign on a brochure that requires heavy graphics and NOT, I repeat, NOT a catalog or any document that is more that 4 pages long.

Dood, that's the silliest thing I've ever hear – nothing over four pages long? That's like saying OS X is great as long as you only run one application at a time and make sure to quit it before launching the next. Catalogs and annual reports are huge industries, and even the simple documents I work on are 20+ pages.

The real issue is that InDesign has no killer feature over Quark, and Quark has some very, very powerful features. Does InDesign allow me to save custom kern pairs for all my fonts? Does it all me to use Xpress Tags to make formatting long (and I mean pages and pages and pages) documents a breeze? Does it allow for scripting to automate those pesky catalogs? Will it allow me to mix my own Hexachrome colors? Can I effectively trap if I need to?

I have nothing against InDesign. I have poked and prodded at it, but it's just another page layout program. Were it not a Adobe product, no one would care.

[brainchild2b]

I'm saying from a business standpoint if you have to bet on Quark or InDesign being around in 5 years where are you going to bet your clients money?

ps, here is the rant from Arstechnica:

As a long time prepress technician, I can tell you that for years I have loathed Quark and wish it its speedy demise (this goes all the way back to version 3.3x).

I couldn't care a hoot about how entrenched it is in the design community, when it comes to the technical end of things (read PostScript) Adobe has had the love of the prepress community since PageMaker 6.0.

I would gladly take an InDesign file over Quark, PageMaker, FreeHand, or any of the other Johnny-Come-Lately's. Aside from InDesign's speed issues, I think most prepress techs feel the same way.

Reason being, if you make it in InDesign, it will RIP. Every time. InDesign will not allow a user or designer or tech to do anything that is "illegal" in PostScript.

Quark users' (as well as idiotic PageMaker and FreeHand users') workflow be damned, I have every right to be selfish when it comes to those many many hours of my life that I'll never get back due to bad design and engineering.

[suhail]

Originally posted by Don Pickett:


Dood, that's the silliest thing I've ever hear – nothing over four pages long? That's like saying OS X is great as long as you only run one application at a time and make sure to quit it before launching the next. Catalogs and annual reports are huge industries, and even the simple documents I work on are 20+ pages.

The real issue is that InDesign has no killer feature over Quark, and Quark has some very, very powerful features. Does InDesign allow me to save custom kern pairs for all my fonts? Does it all me to use Xpress Tags to make formatting long (and I mean pages and pages and pages) documents a breeze? Does it allow for scripting to automate those pesky catalogs? Will it allow me to mix my own Hexachrome colors? Can I effectively trap if I need to?

I have nothing against InDesign. I have poked and prodded at it, but it's just another page layout program. Were it not a Adobe product, no one would care.

Uhhh… Yes it do dee does!

But it's not fast enough to do long documents, it does them… but I wouldn't try it. And if Adobe fixes this issue then ByeBye Quark and Hello InDesign.

[Don Pickett]

Originally posted by brainchild2b:
Reason being, if you make it in InDesign, it will RIP. Every time. InDesign will not allow a user or designer or tech to do anything that is "illegal" in PostScript.

I call bullshit. I can think of three of my designers who can make a RIP choke no matter what program they use. In fact, I'd bet $1,000 on it.

Yes, some of my designers are that bad. I think one of them just set the world's record for Most Textboxes on a Page.

[Don Pickett]

Originally posted by suhail:



Uhhh… Yes it do dee does!

But it's not fast enough to do long documents, it does them… but I wouldn't try it. And if Adobe fixes this issue then ByeBye Quark and Hello InDesign.

You sure? Do you even know what Xpress tags are?

[suhail]

Originally posted by Don Pickett:


I call bullxxx. I can think of three of my designers who can make a RIP choke no matter what program they use. In fact, I'd bet $1,000 on it.

Yes, some of my designers are that bad. I think one of them just set the world's record for Most Textboxes on a Page.

I second that…

We made Heidelberg's $280,000 Prinergy choke a few times

[JLL]

Originally posted by Don Pickett:
The real issue is that InDesign has no killer feature over Quark, and Quark has some very, very powerful features. Does InDesign allow me to save custom kern pairs for all my fonts? Does it all me to use Xpress Tags to make formatting long (and I mean pages and pages and pages) documents a breeze? Does it allow for scripting to automate those pesky catalogs? Will it allow me to mix my own Hexachrome colors? Can I effectively trap if I need to?

I can see that you haven't even tried InDesign.

[JLL]

Originally posted by Don Pickett:


You sure? Do you even know what Xpress tags are?

Do you know what scripting a page layout program is?

InDesign is one of the most scriptable apps.

[suhail]

16+ pages documents = Quark
Brochures, folders, pub covers, and short documents = InDesign

As Apple's TV commercial 'Lemmings' once said:
"You could look into it, or you could go with business as usual"

[Don Pickett]

Originally posted by JLL:


Do you know what scripting a page layout program is?

InDesign is one of the most scriptable apps.

Answer the question. I know what scripting is.

[Don Pickett]

Originally posted by JLL:


I can see that you haven't even tried InDesign.

I've used InDesign. My point is that it doesn't do anything that much better than Quark.

[dadder]

Hey, thanks for the tip on where to find the Redraw XT!!! It says it's for 3.X and 4.X - anyone know if it's fine in 5.X? That's where I'd be using it. I was able to solve this with a complete reinstall of everything (it sent chills down my spine even thinking of doing it). But one of the Mac Genius' in the Minneapolis Apple Store told me to do it, I was like, 'What does this guy know? That's the cop-out answer to everything.', but I tried it and it worked. Darn Mac Doo Doo Head!

[suhail]

Originally posted by Don Pickett:


I've used InDesign. My point is that it doesn't do anything that much better than Quark.

dude,
You've just confirmed JLL's point!




Dadder,
You're welcome I can't believe you had to go through all that re-install
That must've been a major pain!!

I'm gonna use it in QX5 too, so let's see:
I just tried it on a 48 pager 108MB QX5 file and, it is flawless when going from OSX to QX5. But when I zoom in (about 300%), and start the spell checker, and do about 4 quick skips for spellings, the re-draw will fail, I get blank screens from there on. But if I wait till QX re-draws the screen before hitting the skip button the re-draw will continue to work, so it seems.

That is my diagnostics, anyone?

[voodoo]

I guess there is no way to discuss this derailed topic without bias. I am not going into this battle because I have not tried InDesign at all.

It is obvious to me though that some people in here are blinded by their love/hate for a particular company. Stupid people.

I hate Adobe. I like some og their programs, however. Like Photoshop for instance. I hate Adobe more than Microsoft in many ways. At least MS is consistant in its suckiness. Adobe used to be great, but is now making bloatware and generally crappy programs. They have run out of ideas. The difference between PS 4 and PS 7 is neglegable. PS is really at 4.7 or something. Adobe doesn't have a clue.

I hate Quark. I like XPress. From version 4 anyway. I don't love it, the interface is a joke and their stubborness to make XPress look and feel like OS 7 is absurd. They are good in three important ways: XPress is insanely stable (4.03 passport) in Mac OS 8.5 and apparently 9.2 as well. Although my use of XPress has diminished since I switched to Mac OS X. Another plus for XPress is the low number of updates. It is great! Quark policy is to write a piece of software and release it when it is ready. Unlike Adobe, that has taken up the PeeCee Windowsish policy of writing something, release it and patch it afterwards. I know that when I install XPress it will run flawlessly. I don't trust Adobe to do that any more. Lastly the benefit of XPress is the lighteness of the program. It runs superbly on a 040! What professional design app can boast that today?

As I said I am not going into the debate of XPress vs. InDesign, due to the fact that I have no experience with InDesign, but as for the original topic: Quark will release a carbonized/cocoa version of XPress when it is ready. Quark always takes long time to make updates, because it makes them well. I trust them. Apparently there is some disagreement of the quality of XPress, but the people who argue so passionately against XPress are fools. They may have experienced some problem(s) with XPress, but in all the YEARS I have used that program I have NEVER had a SINGLE XPress related problem. There are people (and I suspect the naysayers of belonging to this group of people) that are so incredibly dense that most of the "problems" they are having are their own fault. Computer illiterates and Adobe zealots. If there is a bad thing to be said about XPress (and I have names a few) there are ten times more bad things to be said about the latest Adobe apps.

[lookmark]

Apparently Quark is now selling Quark 5 with free upgrades to Quark 6 (for anything over a small amount of seats) in order to boost sales and get some income. This has been the scenario at my company.

Clearly Quark 5 sales have been very poor -- as well as they should be.

Meanwhile the Quark rep showed the head of my IT working version of Quark 6 running on OS X. How well it actually worked and how many bugs and issues there were to fix, I don't know. Wish I could 've been a fly on the wall for that demo. I'm sure the answer to the latter question is a lot.

By the way, if you're a serious designer and/or Quark user, running Quark in Classic is just not acceptable -- or barely acceptable at best (and yes, even with the very helpful Classic Draw XT). It's just clunky and a major pain in the ass. So setting up a designer with OS X and Quark is guaranteed for the poor person to be begging to return to OS 9. Ain't a fair test for X.

Personally, I like InDesign a great deal. It's got promise. If it continues to evolve at the rate it's been going, and Quark doesn't shape up soon, I think the next rev of InDesign will give Quark a serious run for its money. Some standards do dissolve, you know -- if they deserve to.

[drmcnutt]

Originally posted by dadder:

What could possibly want them to switch back? What more do they need than:
Quark 5
Photoshop 7
ImageReady 7
Illustrator 10
Distiller 5
Dreamweaver MX
Flash MX
Fireworks MX
Transmit 2.1
Most drivers are available for printers, scanners, etc.
Are they just not keeping up with the latest updates that are out there? Hmmmm.

How about someone to pay for it all?

DRM

[JLL]

Originally posted by voodoo:
Quark policy is to write a piece of software and release it when it is ready.

What?? Once upon a time there was a little program called QuarkXPress 4.0…

[theolein]

<quark rant>
I post anti-quark postings almost reflexively(sic). My beeef with quark is still mTropolis after all these when they killed it in 1998. If there was ever a braindead company that had no idea on how to develop, use, market or sell a product, it is quark. Quark has had no selling product apart from XPress and it's copydesk crap, ever. Quark tried ridiculous ventures like trying to turn quark into a web page layout programm in the middle 90's which did nothing for them except get people who actually *make* web pages laugh at them. Likewise their attempt in the early 90's to get into multimedia (when CD-ROM production was still a big thing) with that POS known as Immedia made so many multimedia programmers, who were using, hypertalk, director or mtropolis, almost die with convulsions at the absolute imbecility of trying to use an XTension within xpress(a page layout programme) to make usable multimedia applications. Quarks hideous attempts *in exactly the same manner* with that titanically useless POS known as avenue to get xpress layouters to suddenly understand and use XML from within xpress (yup, the morons made it a part of xpress again) has not exactly met with either success or respect in that part of the industry which is interested in cross-media publishing. Quark almost always tries to do a microsoft type of lock-in with their latest and greatest, but has yet to realise that the publishing industry is not the PC industry and that Microsoft is one or two steps larger than they are. Quark bought (probably for the simple reason that mTropolis' libaries' windows looked and behaved similarly to xpress' libraies' windows)then ignored mTropolis completely leaving the original developers with no money for further development or marketing. Quark was then immensly surprised when they discovered that mtropolis's sales had not picked up in the meantime, they killed it. They never managed to sell the code to anyone, because, typically quark, they wanted around 16 million for it in the beginning. Later, also typically quark, when all interest had died down and only mtropolis die hards were still trying to get the code, they still wanted 1 million for it. GPL'ing the code also never occured to them and so mtropolis source code is still in a vault somewhere in denver next to fred ibrahimi's nostalgic (and rather large) collection of failed quark products.
</quark rant>

I don't harbour any good feelings for quark whatsoever. If they go under, they themselves are to blame and no one on this planet will miss them.

[suhail]

mTropolis…
I do remember that sad story. As sad as the Newton

But so far QX it is the only game out there for larger pubs. That is till stinky Adobe gets InDesign to run faster, and I mean faster.

[melanie]

I am the IT department (Network Administator) here as well as the webmaster and I run the entire network from my Powerbook...that is the Windows 2000 network...using remote desktop connection client for mac, sure I have a PC but only really use it to program the phone system and manage users for our SQL database programs both of which I can do using virtal pc if need be. As for Outlook, we run exchange 2000 and I use th Mail app in OS X to get my internal exchange account with no problem.
The majority of IT guys have never touched a mac. It is unfamiliar territory that they would rather avoid because it makes them feel dumb. I know because I ask them. I even get calls from other IT people who ask me mac questions over the phone to help them in their local networks on set-up, my twin brother is a great example. His boss sends him on all the mac setup call because he thinks he is an expert and he know nothing but my phone number.
I have been here two years and have yet to fix a mac for any reason. However, I definitely have job security because 75% of my job is PC troublshooting related....granted it is mostly ID10.T errors but we have our fair share of hardware issues as well.
I am considering going over to InDesign as well. I hate restarting my computer in classic to get Quark 4 to run properly. It is the only app I need classic for..
Well, that is my $.02
melanie

[:haripu:]

anyone remember Quark Xposure? It was a supposed competitor to Photoshop and was shaping quite well, as I remember. There were a few alphas floating around quite a lot of press coverage, and then … nothing. Never heard of it ever after.

Sometimes you really have to wonder with those Quark guys.

[Mac Guru]

Where do you guys get off belching this crud about "you better save all your pamphlets for InDesign and large documents for Quark"? The last place I worked I had a 100-200 page magazine I had to publish every week and guess what I did it in WITH NOT A SINGLE PROBLEM... InDesign. Not a hitch at all. The best thing was ripping to PDF (100-200pg's in 20 min compared to an hour and a half in Distiller from Quark)

All this BS about Printers not accepting InDesign files is pure bull poo-poo. If a Printer says no, you DON'T give them business, simple as that. I can't think of ONE printer in my area that won't take an ID file. Like someone said earlier, printers have to have not only any kind of software but any kind of drive as well.. I've seen people bring in those god aweful MO disks even today. Get over yourselves, in order to do business you need to be capable of interfacing with your customers... and if you refuse, you lose business.

Use wich ever program you wish but quit spewing BS all over this thread. PLEASE.

Mac Guru

P.S.- it's Mac OS X

[voodoo]

This is not a Quark vs. Adobe thread! Get over it already!!

I am going to laugh heartily at you whiners when Quark releases a Cocoa version XPress for OSX. There is a reason for the delay and it is that Quark is rewriting XPress from ground up.

[JLL]

Originally posted by voodoo:
This is not a Quark vs. Adobe thread! Get over it already!!

I am going to laugh heartily at you whiners when Quark releases a Cocoa version XPress for OSX. There is a reason for the delay and it is that Quark is rewriting XPress from ground up.

They won't release a Cocoa version - they are rewriting the app. (again), but not in Cocoa.

QXP6 will be released simultaneously for Mac OS X and Windows XP.

It will probably introduce a brand new and revolutionary look: Platinum - well to Quark that is a brand new look

Btw. the reason for the delay is not that they are rewritting QXP - it's because they started too late.

[suhail]

I really hope the new Quark has more than ONE undo.


Mac Guru,
I'm glad someone has done a large pub in InDesign, I'm quite nervous to start doing that because of it's speed issue, I'll wait till it gets faster.

[Mac Guru]

I'm laughing right now because you're here yelling that this wasn't a debate with Quark vs. InDesign when in fact it was looking like quite an argument. I'm no whiner, I made the switch from Quark to ID 2. You're making this sound like we're FORCED to use ID because Quark is still for 9. Some of us made the switch and are stating our arguments FOR it. You get over it.

As for doing full time work in InDesign, GO FOR IT, there's really nothing to be nervous about. If you jump into it you shouldn't face any problems.

Mac Guru

[dadder]

Originally posted by drmcnutt:


How about someone to pay for it all?

DRM

(Somewhat off topic)
I guess I was referring to the fact that every company needs to build in to their cost the cost of upgrading. These upgrades that I'm referring to for our company have occurred over the past 6 months and as long as they are done methodically and intelligently, it can be affordable. I don't know of any company that couldn't throw $200/mo into software. It just means the big cheese and their partners can't have their lunch at Red Lobster every Friday or that you have to cut back on a few of those magazine subscriptions that really truly don't get read. Believe me, there are much better things to be spending money on and ways to 'find' the money. Besides, having current software and hardware is very much productive. Can you imagine still using Toast 4 in System 9 to burn CDs rather than OS X drag and drop? That has literally saved me a full days work in a months time.
Oh, and about this thread and these anxiety attacks everyone is having... remember, these threads are just like email and can be interpreted very differently from the way the writer has intended. Without voice fluctuations, you have no idea what exactly that person was really trying to say. Please, try to take the most positive aspect you can when reading. Now, have you heard enough of my lecturing? (And I mean that in the most humorous way possible)

[drmcnutt]

Originally posted by dadder:

(Somewhat off topic)
I guess I was referring to the fact that every company needs to build in to their cost the cost of upgrading. These upgrades that I'm referring to for our company have occurred over the past 6 months and as long as they are done methodically and intelligently, it can be affordable. I don't know of any company that couldn't throw $200/mo into software. It just means the big cheese and their partners can't have their lunch at Red Lobster every Friday or that you have to cut back on a few of those magazine subscriptions that really truly don't get read. Believe me, there are much better things to be spending money on and ways to 'find' the money. Besides, having current software and hardware is very much productive. Can you imagine still using Toast 4 in System 9 to burn CDs rather than OS X drag and drop? That has literally saved me a full days work in a months time.
Oh, and about this thread and these anxiety attacks everyone is having... remember, these threads are just like email and can be interpreted very differently from the way the writer has intended. Without voice fluctuations, you have no idea what exactly that person was really trying to say. Please, try to take the most positive aspect you can when reading. Now, have you heard enough of my lecturing? (And I mean that in the most humorous way possible)

I think I understand what you mean and I was trying to be sarcastic with my comment without an emoticon. I do think it's funny how the software companies have a certain demographic of consumer hinged to these software updates.

The newspaper I work at in 99% of their workflow use features that have been around since Photoshop 4 and Quark 3.3 and there are still stations with such software. Our director has recently gotten the approval and money to upgrade everyone to new g4's and Indesign based Ad Management system.

This is a major capital expenditure (not to be repeated for probably another 3 years When Indesign 5 and Quark 6.5 are out) and the company is aligning it with increased productivity. The popular do more with less resources were software can sometimes elevate production depending on the task.

The irony is that many of the artists that were fast and productive before are now forced to relearn techniques in new programs and this has taken a toll on production and the overtime tab. Many of these artists have jumped from G3's with AI 8 and Photoshop 5 to current OSX equivilents and are trying to make do through the learning curve.

It's interesting that they can do the same caliber of work with "antiquated" software and faster in some cases. An arguement against the "required" upgrade path. Of course I fall into the other category with all the new toys at home, but I digress...

DRM

[lookmark]

Originally posted by drmcnutt:

It's interesting that they can do the same caliber of work with "antiquated" software and faster in some cases. An arguement against the "required" upgrade path. Of course I fall into the other category with all the new toys at home, but I digress...

DRM

But that can be used an argument against all (and any) change. There's always going to be a transition period, and a learning curve. And switching to a new OS and new layout software presents *a lot* of changes. The question is whether productivity and efficiency increases a suitable period after the transition is complete.

I'm not saying all change is good, of course. Whether now is the time to, say, move to InDesign and OS X on new G4s, or whether it's better to instead wait another year for Quark -- it all depends on circumstances.

[Robb]

Those of us waiting for the OS X version of Quark XPress may be in for an even longer wait. Here's the story:

http://www.macedition.com/nmr/nmr_20021126.php

[suhail]

Seriously…
If Quark does not appear by MWSF, I'm gonna start converting all my Catalogs into InDesign. I also have a business to run.

[Don Pickett]

Originally posted by Robb:
Those of us waiting for the OS X version of Quark XPress may be in for an even longer wait. Here's the story:

http://www.macedition.com/nmr/nmr_20021126.php

I heard about this the other day and I'm waiting for more confirmation. Two possibilites:

1) It's a tempest in a teapot. Quark has made some silly statements in the past, and maybe this is another one;

2) Quark is simultaneously abandoning the market to Adobe and committing corporate suicide. If this is true, Adobe's gonna have to make InDesign a whole lot better for long document construction before it's as good as Quark.

Oh, yeah: Anyone who says "publishing is dying" deserves to have his company disappear underneath him.

[::maroma::]

Originally posted by Robb:
Those of us waiting for the OS X version of Quark XPress may be in for an even longer wait. Here's the story:

http://www.macedition.com/nmr/nmr_20021126.php

From the article:

"Indeed, these witnesses attest, audience questions about Mac OS X provoked an Ebrahimi tirade of Old Testament proportions: Quark’s Dear Leader told his squirming guests that “the Macintosh platform is shrinking,” and that “publishing is dying.” He suggested that anyone dissatisfied with Quark’s Mac commitment should “switch to something else,” although he insisted that making the move to Adobe’s long-Carbonized InDesign package is “committing suicide.”"

WHAT IN THE FUKC IS QUARK THINKING???

If the tread Mac users like this, then I say the sooner you die Quark, the better. Quark would not exist without the Mac market. This new CEO guy is a total idiot. This makes me steaming mad. I had been holding on to the hope that Quark was working on an X version that would blow us all away. Sounds like they are doing just the opposite. Now, I have officially put my copy of Xpress in the trash, never to install another version again. A company that treats me (not to mention all the other Mac users) like this does not deserve my money. Publishing is dying?? WTF?? Wow, this guy is WAY out there. I am still trying to make sense of what this moron said. Insane.

Good riddance Quark. May you rot in Hell and spend eternity as the joke of the Publishing Industry. Die.

[suhail]

Oh I forgot to put some of these in my post:

And I think Mr.maroma forgot them too, but don't you worry!… I'll put some for you too:

[MDA]

Does anyone happen to know the email address of Farhad F. Ebrahimi CEO of Quark. As someone who helps to make the software decisions for the advertising agency I work at I'd like to send him a little message about what our next choice will be. Thanks.

MDA

[voodoo]

I..... don't....... .. believe.... what I have ... .. seen.

Will Microsoft abandon Office?

Will Adobe kill Photoshop?

WTF?

Is this CEO of Quark INSANE

Publishing isn't dying, it is this man's brain that is on life support!!

[lookmark]

Hmm, I expect we'll be seeing some spin control coming out of Quark pretty soon.

Publishing has been in for a bumpy ride, but "dying" is ridiculous -- if the NMR quotations are accurate.

Anyway, I don't think Quark will be abandoning Quark for OS X. (Talk about suicide.) It'll just be very.... very.... late.

I'm certainly glad to be using InDesign; it's future is looking better and better every day.