JeevesBond — Thu, 15 Sep 2005 19:38:41 +0000

Megan wrote: (which is another thing MS has been grumbling about lately).

Lately? Protecting their precious API is something they've been doing for a while! See Mr Ballmer jumping around like an idiot: http://www.ntk.net/media/developers.mpg

And a good theory about why: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/APIWar.html

Anyway, I've always found that funny so thought I'd share.

Back to the point, well haven't got much to add except noting that MS are yet again trying to write their own hooks into software that would otherwise be using an open format.

Quote: An Adobe representative was not immediately available for comment.

A shame, I'd love to know what's going through their minds at the moment.

Quote: Microsoft's Metro printing engine--which has been described by some analysts as a "PDF killer"

Rubbish, pdf is an open standard (not to be confused with Acrobat which is an application), I can imagine this'll just be another binary format like a Word document. Can't imagine anything can really improve upon what pdf has to offer aside from XML (both have a purpose IMO).

Megan — Thu, 15 Sep 2005 13:42:41 +0000

Found a little more info yesterday:

Quote: The company outlined plans for three graphics programs: Acrylic Graphic Designer, a painting, illustration and effects tool that combines vector-based and bitmap abilities; Sparkle Interactive Designer, a tool for application developers to design software user interfaces; and Quartz Web Designer, a tool for designing Web sites.

Source

The first one sounds somewhat interesting - like Fireworks but not so web design-centric. The second one looks like an attempt to keep software development on the desktop and not the web (which is another thing MS has been grumbling about lately). Why would you call a tool for software developers "sparkle"? Sounds like something that should be targetted to teenage girls. The third one - I wonder how that is different from FrontPage or if it would be a replacement or what.

bja888 — Thu, 18 Aug 2005 15:03:41 +0000

Proubaly not SP2 as much as .net framework. When I got into .net earlier this summer I downloaded the visual program that has something to do with asp. It have .net framework 2.0 Beta 2. The server I pay a ton of money for every month only has version 1.1. So I learned the diffrence between the 2 fast. I cant wait till 2.0 comes out. It is way more powerfull than 1.1 or anything before .net.

The point of that whole story..... microsoft isnt going to write a program untill its easy to do. With older programming environments it too hard. So they dont do that stuff. Actually, I think I'm digging a hole here. I will stop.

Megan — Thu, 18 Aug 2005 14:44:32 +0000

It's also only in Beta 1 so it probably won't actually be out until next year. AND you'll need SP2 to run it.

vibins — Thu, 18 Aug 2005 14:15:18 +0000

Quote: are you ready for this??? Tabbed browsing

Why are microsoft always years behind in technology. Are they afraid to take risks.

Megan — Thu, 18 Aug 2005 13:21:05 +0000

IE acutally does have a new version coming out (gasp! With, are you ready for this??? Tabbed browsing :eek: ! Still pretty bare bones though from what it sounds like.)

Anyway, I don't think MS is going to make any sort of a serious dent in Adobe's dominance anyway. Look at all the graphic designers who never stopped using Macs. They've got some loyalty. I agree that there's only so much you can do with Photoshoop - I haven't upgraded since v. 6 because there hasn't been much of a change (and what else do you need, anyway)?

What I woul dlike to see Adobe do is adopt the Macromedia interface. Specifically the Flash interface in Photoshop and Illustrator.

WarriorFX — Thu, 18 Aug 2005 05:18:21 +0000

JeevesBond wrote: Adobe has definately been getting a little too big for its boots recently, I personally cannot see much of a difference between products at versions CS and CS2 - another typically date instead of feature based release... Very annoying.

Microsoft is waaaay to big. There is only so much you can push Photoshop... look at Microsoft's Internet Explorer - when was the last time they upgraded that??? There are a lot of new browser features they are lacking... and FireFox is pushing them to finally come up with something - FAST...

WarriorFX — Thu, 18 Aug 2005 05:10:21 +0000

Adobe has things licked - good for them. Their acquisition of Macromedia will only help those software aps better integrate with Adobe's flagship products. And integration between strong software is a huge plus in this industry. And Redmonton has nothing on this Audio/Visual powerhouse! But if Microsoft acquired Adobe - they would mess the whole thing up.

my .02

vibins — Wed, 17 Aug 2005 14:26:12 +0000

I cant wait to see what adobe do with flash. maybe they will intergrate photoshop into it.
Then you could have amazing graphics with slick movement.

JeevesBond — Wed, 17 Aug 2005 12:32:21 +0000

It would be good if Adobe had competition, that's true but why does it have to be MS... Which is the lesser of the two evils?

Adobe has definately been getting a little too big for its boots recently, I personally cannot see much of a difference between products at versions CS and CS2 - another typically date instead of feature based release... Very annoying.