[Closed] FrameMaker 7.x/8 Feature Requests

I agree David. No purchase of Adobe products until something changes.

FrameMaker 7.1 for Mac OS X not supported???

This is my last straw with Adobe... I've purchased (personally and professionally), used, supported, and promoted a large variety of Adobe products since 1993 and been a big proponent of the company through the good and bad years. Products include:

Adobe Photoshop 3 for SGI
Adobe Photoshop 3 for Sun
Adobe Photoshop 3 for Mac
Adobe Photoshop 5.5 for Mac
Adobe Photoshop 7 for Mac OS X

Adobe Illustrator 5.5 for SGI
Adobe Illustrator 5.5 for Sun
Adobe Illustrator 5.5 for Mac
Adobe Illustrator 8 for Mac
Adobe Illustrator 10 for Mac OS X

Adobe Premiere 4.2 for SGI
Adobe Premiere 4.2 for Mac

In addition I've purchased (personally and professionally), used and promoted GoLive products pre and post Adobe acquisition

GoLive Cyberstudio 3 Mac
Adobe GoLive 4 Mac

In addition I've purchased (personally and professionally), used, supported and promoted FrameMaker products pre and post Adobe acquisition

FrameTech FrameMaker 4 for SGI
FrameTech FrameMaker 5 for SGI
FrameTech FrameMaker 5 for Mac
Adobe FrameMaker 5.5 for SGI
Adobe FrameMaker 5.5 for Mac
Adobe FrameMaker 6 for Sun

In many cases (professionally) large quantities of licenses were purchased. After watching what occurred with Premiere (instability, bugs, etc), Cyberstudio (lack of interest, support, etc) and now with FrameMaker (no Mac OS X UNIX version??? Linux Version??? - FrameMaker started on UNIX!), I realized that Adobe has lost touch with its "loyal" customers. Especially, today with very comparable products available through opensource (Gimp, Cinepaint, LaTex, Scribus, etc) and commercial (Dreamweaver, Freehand, Flash, QuarkXpress, etc). Until Adobe changes it attitudes and practices, I will NEVER purchase, promote, or recommend an Adobe product again (personally or professionally)

Why bother with feature requests. FrameMaker is finally a dead product (for the Mac) as was published in MacAddict this month. The PC may have a year or two left, but it is really time to start getting used to InDesign. I really hope Adobe bothers to post the InDesign CS tryout at some point for the Mac.

The open source XML products are rapidly making FM a program of the past (since it hasn't been updated since FM4). KOffice has now been ported over to OSX and that may become the new FM.

If Adobe cares about technical documents they will get their act going and come out with an OSX version. If not...the wheel will stop spinning due to friction. I fear the wheel has already fallen off and is rolling around on the floor.

Why can't Adobe be a good company like Macromedia?

(it is Friday...I"ve worked a bit much this week)

If given a choice between getting a FrameMaker grammar checker, or getting some number of the other feature requests identified in the preceding 443 unfulfilled posts to this thread, please put me down for "some of the other."

Wheee! -- the FrameMaker development glacier races downhill!

Cheers,
Riley

First off, apologies for starting a topic that seems to be drifting away from feature requests. That said, just one more post... ;^)

Ken:

>>You simply cannot treat them too seriously. However, I do find that a grammar checkers are useful for finding errors.<<

I used to think that. I used to think grammar checkers were useless for advanced writers, who create sophisticated sentences the software can't handle, but useful for weak writers who generate a large number of errors. After observing the results of Word's on-the-fly grammar checking (which is on by default) in a large population of writers at various skill levels, I no longer think so: Word flags so many sentences that aren't really errors that I believe it actively confuses weak writers and makes their writing worse. This might not be quite as bad with a grammar checker that you had to deliberately invoke, but even so, the writers I'm thinking of are done no service by software that makes them feel uncertain about even the things they're doing right.

>>I personally find that many errors in my writing I simply do not see despite how many times I proofread them.<<

You are no doubt a skilled enough writer to ignore the ten bogus flags you see for every one that helps you by catching a real error. You may not realize how special that makes you! ;^)

Just my humble $.02...

-Bill

$1500?!?! Hmmmm, they can keep it, I guess.

Cheers,

Sean

The grammar checker that Arnis mentioned is - gasp - $1500 for one person. My Harbrace College handbook, via a library book sale, cost $1.

And I agree with several previous posters that American English grammar is too much for a mere computer, at least at this time. Maybe when we get to 512-bit processors running at 10-gig, 10 gigs memory, 1 terabyte disks. and Windows (fill in your own definition)...

Well, while I mostly agree with y'all about grammar checkers, I do not that I never miss a sentence-ending period in Word but have occasionally in FrameMaker. It would be nice to have the resource as a plug-in for such things.

I agree with Bill's assessment of grammar checkers with respect to their suggested remedies. You simply cannot treat them too seriously. However, I do find that a grammar checkers are useful for finding errors. I personally find that many errors in my writing I simply do not see despite how many times I proofread them. I use a grammar checker to identify potential errors, which I then read carefully and either fix or not as appropriate. Once I have proofread a paper I have written I run the grammar checker and invariable find more than a few gramatical errors.

-Ken

I agree that grammar checking is something I do NOT want incorporated into any of my tools.

Re: "plugins, turning off": I would add the abilty to discard certain plug-ins entirely to fight user interface clutter. One of Word's primary obnoxiousnesses, which Microsoft has tried unsuccessfully to resolve with its too-clever-by-half "adaptive" menus, is the breadth and depth of its menu system.