Adobe, Linux Support, and the Linux Foundation.

[gai.ra.III]

While generally I've only lurked the Adobe forums I've finally worked up guts to post this. I also know that about every 1-2 months this question is asked but I think it deserves a another go around.

My premises is this:

Adobe joined the Linux Foundation in 2008 for a focus on Linux for Web 2.0  Applications like Adobe® Flash® Player and Adobe AIR™. Currently Adobe holds a silver membership status with the Linux Foundation. So why in the world do they not have any Creative Cloud Programs available in Linux without the need for WINE and other such workarounds. I think it's a sucky move to support the Linux Foundation and use Linux in the back-end while not doing anything to support actual Linux users who have for at least a decade requested Adobe desktop products on Linux. Sure it's going to take a lot of manpower, financial resources, etc. But to truly support Linux and the Linux Foundation I think it's necessary that y'all do make things like Photoshop and Lightroom available for the Linux desktop. In any regards the wider Linux community would most likely help with testing and debugging programs. We're used to it.

[Branden]

I would like to have Adobe product binaries available; however, Adobe has made it abundantly clear they will never port their software. Why waste our time entertaining the idea when the company has zero intentions of doing so?

[cocoknightcom]

Care to share your sources on that?

[dainiswmichel]

the thing is, this whole "situation" is forcing me to make hardware purchase decisions that i do not want to make, and i am going to say, most likely, that is understood and intentional.

[PaulTSB]

Another vote for Adobe CC on Linux here. I'm a photographer and the ONLY reason I have a Windows computer is for CC. How frustrating is it to sit down to edit your photos after a shoot that you felt went really well only to see...."Windows is installing update number 1 of 15". Guess I'll just pop the kettle on and wait until the machine I use to make money and keep myself eating warm food and living somewhere with a roof decides I can do some work.

Come on Adobe, listen to what we're saying here. Linux ISN'T niche. Pretty much all of the people I know that work in Web development, software development etc use a nix box of some description and my photographer friends WANT to use Linux. I'd much rather spend the money wasted on a Windows licence to buy more RAM or a better processor.

[Christopher Guillou]

I'm really curious about the effects of the Windows10 SpyGate on this situation.

As a photographer I've tried time and time again to find a way out of MS Win and the only thing that's kept me back was Adobe LR + PS, but frankly with the way things are going with W10 I'm not sure I'm going to be upgrading.

The time may have come where the shortcomings of LinuxOS equivalents to LR+PS aren't as bad as the bloat and opaqueness of Windows OS...

[tiernanx]

Dark Table (Lightroom alternative) is actually getting pretty close now and I haven't tried it personally but have heard great things about Pixeluvo.

[Christopher Guillou]

Hey thanks, it's been a while since I've checked up on these !

[DDArt]

Everyone should also be aware when updating that Windows 7 & 8 is going to get the spyware that Windows 10 has.  So the bastards in Redmond are now in fact sending
that User Data back there.  Windows is pushing the KB3075249 AND KB3080149, some say that 50 million users worldwide already has the updates and to top it off it will bypass
firewall, hosts files, and other means to counter this.  The way around is to uninstall the updates and hide them from future installs.

There are other updates that will screw your experience up, so user beware, the more reason we need to dump Win and Mac and switch to some other O/S.  Whatever happened to just
plain O/S designed to be just that and nothing more  Even Mac now shows people's birthdays I have never heard or seen before..

. Good luck you all, time to go search for other KB updates and remove them while we all should send Microcrap some opinionated tweets or emails.

[Weder Clay]

Maybe someone already commented on that.

I wonder if it would not be feasible, at least the Adobe support for the rodassem software with the help of Wine. I see many using Photoshop on Linux through Wine, but there's always a problem.

Adobe to help at least to run their software through Wine satisfactorily, perhaps already a little help. And work for porting would not be so expensive. Even if it charged an additional amount for "DLLs" or something similar, I would pay just to get out of Windows. It would be a possibility if the software rotate well.

We see many companies animation and film production, using Linux to run its main software. Users do not want Linux software for free when I wore only Linux, I had proprietary software on my system, and paid for them.

[PaulTSB]

I think this is the part that many non-linux users don't understand. Yes, the OS is free (as in free beer) but that doesn't mean we're not prepared to pay for a quality product - which Adobe CC undoubtedly is. In fact I'd say for people who are more than casual computer users , I'm thinking photographers, film makers, graphic designers and web designers here - whether enthusiasts or pro's - would be more willing to pay for products like Adobe if they can also factor out a Windows licence as well. Wouldn't this help re-enforce Adobes' anti-piracy efforts and also gain a whole new user base? Win-win as far as I can see.

[shawnk17193288]

There is a lot of commercial software available on Linux. In fact, as far as content creation goes, Adobe is really an exception. Autodesk, The Foundry, Solid Angle, Pixar - just to name a few. I think it's a huge misconception that Linux users are just a bunch of rogue computer nerds.

If/when I start my own post production company, I will be using Linux. As a result, Adobe will not be part of my pipeline.

[BigLittle8712]

At least make the old Macromedia products for Linux. I need Dreamweaver & Fireworks for Linux!

[Laura_Chiorazzo]

I want to go out from Windows I don't like it!! But there are some Apps including Adobe that is not compatible with Ubuntu

[andy_bob_newton]

Unfortunately, there are only three options at this stage. run windows or mac, maybe as a dual boot system, with all their problems and just put up with it, use the alternatives that are available (there's a few listed above by myself and others) which is what I'm moving to do at the moment or use a virtual machine with hardware emulation and PCIe pass through on the GPU. this last option is really the only way to have decent adobe performance on Linux but it is no easy task. its covered here Skylake Linux Box with PCIe Passthrough - OVMF + Qemu + KVM = GTA V - YouTube with a focus on gaming but it would fine with adobe and it has a link to more info in the description but for now it may be more work than its worth for some. If abobe is an absolute must and so is linux (which is more important than adobe) then either it or dual booting are your only options. otherwise consider moving to things like pixeluvo, blender and the other Linux/cross-platform alternatives

[mytaxsite]

run windows or mac, maybe as a dual boot system, with all their

problems and just put up with it,

There is nothing wrong in running Windows in dual boot mode with Linux.

You are the first one to tell us this here without explicitly spelling

it out what these "all their problems" are.

It is amazing that people are still expecting Adobe to release their

products for Linux Operating System. The sensible thing is to either

continue using Windows, Apple MAC or simply go and find something

different. Windows and MAC are going to remain here and Adobe is going

to continue supporting them as long as there is "enough" demand for CC

to run on them.

Few weeks ago, I saw an AD from DELL announcing DELL Ubuntu for the UK

market. That has now been removed because not many people wanted these

machines (apparently). The machines were pretty cheap and I was thing

of getting one to install Windows (instead of Ubuntu) but I can't find

it now. US website has still got it so you guys can go and buy it while

they are still available.

[mytaxsite]

want to go out from Windows I don't like it!! But there are some Apps

including Adobe that is not compatible with Ubuntu

Not compatible? I thought they just can't run at all. Windows programs

comes in binaries while Linux being Open Source has its own format which

you need to ask in Ubuntu forums if you are interested to know about it.

[filmographie]

How do I put up with this compatibility stuff? Run 2 computers at each workstation and switch via a KVM switch - CC runs on dedicated edit boxes (Mac or PC) that are never used for email or office type stuff - those can be Linux, Mac or PC. Files are shared through a Ubuntu Samba Server/SAN network.

This is not a new thing - a biotech company I worked for in the late 1990's had a network with Unix, Linux, VAX, Solaris, Mac and PC machines that shared files through a Novell server (another flavor of Unix). PhD types often had deeper skills in Unix & VAX/VMS than the IT staff. Each OS/machine was used for its strengths.Users varied in skill levels - the office staff stuck with PCs while researchers used whatever made sense for each application. It is pretty much the same today from what former co-workers tell me.

[javierocampos]

I apologize for input English is not my native language, but I would add something to the debate because although I see some reason many still do not find a truly convincing answer Why make Adobe CC for Linux? I think that's not the question, the question is why not? The niche of users occupying Windows users is vastly superior, that is something I will not deny and one of the main reasons is because supported precisely companies like Adobe and suites as Adobe CC that Linux does not exist, having to resort to alternative Open Source, which although laudable and there are people doing great work the truth is that a general fall far behind in terms of features about Adobe solutions CC, especially for those who do not have those divine gifts to those amazing work can be seen on YouTube with any tool, including Microsoft Paint ... But why the number of users is used as justification for not develop something that we have spent years asking for Linux users? I do not want to get into debate about which OS is better, but the niche users who add all Linux distributions than or at least equal in number to the MacOSX users; I do not have actual data, but Steve Jobs boasted 50 million users who had MacOSX worldwide, but only adding users Ubuntu and Fedora in 2009, Linux reached 36 million users in total, not counting the rest distributions.

Linux is now being adopted in countries such as Germany or Italy and France for government organizations using Photoshop was replaced by Krita at the University of Paris 8 Why? I'm not saying that Adobe acquired the Open Source philosophy, I am not against proprietary software, but the Open Source (not speaking only of Open Software, but also the Open Hardware) is helping to reduce licensing costs in thousands of institutions and this is ever more noticeable. I live in Mexico and here are cities where technology has not come or comes in the form of piracy because they have the means to pay for software licenses / proprietary hardware, with Linux, LibreOffice or raspberry solutions for technology to reach schools low resources. Be the suite of Adobe CC is not for all these cases but it focuses on a very specific niche, but what I mean is that the Open Source philosophy is to favor growing humanity and the only reason many who work in Windows is precisely as Adobe Software CC.

Gladly you pay a license for Linux if Adobe CC exist on Linux systems but what they are getting to do this? Promote piracy, encourage many users to continue using Windows unlawful manner to provide Software as Adobe CC and not only that, but so ridiculously easy pirating suite Adobe CC, both Windows and MacOSX with the consequent loss of money that entails. It is pointless for (for example) has 50 million users on Windows Adobe CC and 50 in MacOSX if those 100 total pay your license just 10 ...

Promote the use of Open Source, working on a version of Adobe CC for Linux and see how your user community is much appreciated, making that effort in new subscriptions for Adobe. I also encourage them to work more alternative Open Source as Adobe brackets, if there is an Open Source version of programs such as Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator fame Adobe would rise through the roof and it really would not be wasting money by not supporting the cause to make people resort to legal alternatives honored and since most users would use these versions would be precisely those who resorted to piracy using these tools, the faithful to Adobe suite users who continue to use versions being " complete "as it were, as with brackets, that being a great code editor there are still millions of users of Adobe Dreamweaver.

I repeat, I do not say this with any offense or raise controversy, I just hope it will help in the future we may see Adobe CC in Linux.

[jesb1965068]

Adobe will eventually port CC to linux as Microsoft begings to port a lot of their stuff to Linux as well.

Visual Studio Code is a good example but the more important one was the .NET framework itself.

Valve has done the same and they will continue to work on the game industry for us.

I can only assume the code base was written in something fairly platform agnostic like C++ and the hardest part of the port would be the GUI code. My advice for adobe would be to take the leap of faith and move your GUI system to a platform like Qt and let someone else deal with the Windows/Mac/Linux compatibility headache.

This late in 2015 and we're still seeing big commercial things happen for Linux so keep your hopes up everyone.

[MikesterAZ]

It is sad that I run across this thread in 2015 and they still have not provided a Unix solution. I am personally unfamiliar w/ Unix and the main reason is that MS and its cronies have a programming blackout on support for it. So I am more or less coerced into staying. I can't abandon the software I'm accustomed to. I actually found this thread specifically because I'm getting another new workstation, and looking again at whether or not I can actually make a free market decision about what OS to choose. Apparently my choices are still limited by the cronyism of the entrenched players. Having said all that I want to bring up a related idea, which is that seeing this thread gives me a little less hope that another one of my peeves, that the mobile apps are only available to iSnobs, will be addressed. I know there has been a huge demand from Android users like me that has gone similarly ignored. We pay good money for our subscriptions and we ought to be able to use them on a device of our choosing!! It's not your job to decide what else we can or can't use. Stop the insanity!! Unix and Android are both giant market segments. You are crazy NOT to support us!!

[filmographie]

I think I can safely say that Adobe both wants and needs to be on the Linux platform to attract large film studio subscriptions, but there are two big problems right now.

The first is that Apple has recently made so many changes to OS-X that all the existing programmers are working as hard as they can trying to keep up with the changes so Mac platform support stays current.

The second is money - more people subscribing to CC means that money will become available to increase the head count so they can hire engineers specifically to work on Linux development.

If you really want a Linux version of CC, urge everyone you know to become a subscriber so the cash flow improves. Adobe took a HUGE risk two years ago when they decided to switch over to subscriptions and they finally have enough subscriptions to break even - more will be required to be able develop for Linux. (note that in hindsight this is now seen as a wise move and others (Autodesk & Blackmagic) are following suit - but at the time it meant Adobe began to lose money until subscriptions picked up the slack)

[JordanMichael08]

There is no justification to create a department to develop Linux Applications because Nix boxes are mostly used by hobbyists and academics.  Adobe is making products for businesses.  Mind should boggle if Adobe, Microsoft and Apple starts developing products for Linux boxes because that is the first step for harakiri for senior executives.

I'm a senior software engineer at a company. Adobe CC being unavailable in a Linux box is the single most poignant reason why we aren't running our creatives in a Linux environment.

The idea that Linux is for academics and hobbyists is wrong. It's performance would be amazing if the tools were available on it. Furthermore businesses like low cost equipment and Microsoft licensing issues in an office setting are nightmarish.

We have everything else figured out with our machines except for good replacements for Photoshop and After Effects.

I think that Adobe could do good to add people TO it's market, instead of see people fade from it.

[filmographie]

Adobe seems to share your feelings that a Linux version of CC would be a good thing. Encourage others to subscribe to CC and next time you are at a trade show where Adobe is represented - march right up and tell them that you'd rather have CC support on Linux. It works even better if you could say something like "we'd deploy x more subscriptions of CC if we could do it on Linux".

If enough people do that, Adobe might decide to borrow a little money so they could get the Linux port up and running ASAP.

[andy_bob_newton]

firstly, to Jordan Michael, id like to suggest you take a look at pixeluvo as an alternative to photoshop since it's almost identical in how I use it and blender as an alternative to after effects depending on how you use it and what you do with it. There's also the suite from the foundry with software like nuke which are great for visual effects. The problem is the time it takes to learn and integrate into existing workflows.

filmograhie, we know the Adobe community wants it but where have Adobe themselves shown any interest in porting to linux? Years ago they said it was on the table and as far as I'm aware (though Im hoping they'll change their minds), they are yet to make any step towards progressing with it.  to me at least, it seems more like they will only make a Linux cc when their entire user base leaves Windows and Mac and says they'll unsubscribe if adobe doesn't produce a port which unlikely because of how many currently use the cc software in their work

[filmographie]

Scuttlebutt in San Francisco has it that every time the Adobe programmers begin to work on a Linux port Apple releases a lot of changes that pull them off target. Is this a plot by Apple to derail the Adobe efforts? Possibly - The Adobe/Apple relationship over the past 25 years has not always been a happy one :-).