InDesign CS5

[Petteri_Paananen]

David and Anne-Marie has made an excellent article about InDesign CS5 new features...

http://indesignsecrets.com/roundup-of-indesign-cs5-features-honest-this-time.php

I´m very exited specially about those new interactive features...

[Eugene Tyson]

Oh yeh... how forgetful am I, thanks Bob and Harbs.

[Eugene Tyson]

Just ordered two copies of InDesign and a copy of Flash and the new Acrobat whatever version they're on.

All good. Can't wait

[BobLevine]

There's no new version of Acrobat.

[Eugene Tyson]

Well whatever the latest version is, I've only got Acrobat 7 here. Be nice to be up-to-speed with the rest of the world

It's version 9 they're on now. Doing forms in 7 is a nightmare. Be nice to have this addition to our workflow and streamline bookings etc. for events through forms.

[Mr. Met]

Is there anywhere on the adobe site to see a video just for ID CS5? I see the general promo video but was hoping to see an ID video, PS video, etc. for CS5 upgrades.

I saw the online presentation this morning. PS smart fill after cutting out a silhouette is awesome. I don't do enough interactive to get to excited about the other offerrings but I think I may have to invest the time and money to become more proficient in interactive design/production.

[Eugene Tyson]

I'm not aware of any, if I find some I'll post them here for you.

[Mr. Met]

When I saw the presentation this morning, one of the commentators said to go to Adobe TV for more but I didn't see anything.

[Eugene Tyson]

Good list of articles here and I posted a video link in the comments

http://indesignsecrets.com/this-week-in-indesign-articles-number-27.php

[Jochen_F__Uebel]

Hi, Harbs.

As Cari Jansen has recently shown vertical spreads are now possible – without any rotation:

http://carijansen.com/2010/05/08/awesome-indesign-cs5-find-by-mike-rankin

(and for german speaking folks:

http://blog.smi.ch/2010/05/08/vertikale-seitenanordnung ).

Mike Rankin, who is mentioned by Cari, actually posted on the new possibility to rotate and/or shear pages; he did not mention the possibility for vertical spreads.

Jochen

[Harbs.]

Yeah. I saw that.

Very cool tip by Cari! It's funny how she gives the credit away! I saw the discussion about transforming pages and did not think of that application...

Harbs

[Peter Kahrel]

Eugene,

>I can live with spanning footnotes as I do it by hand with the "footnotes to endnotes" script

I needed different types of column notes for a job recently and scripted part of it. Maybe it's of use:

http://www.kahrel.plus.com/indesign/foot_to_column.html

A little rough around the edges and some manual work is required, but it speeds up the process.

Peter

[Eugene Tyson]

Peter that is excellent I cannot wait to use it. Thanks for posting it. I've been searching for something like this for a long time.

Eugene

[Big_Jimm]

I went to ID3 from Quark 8. Like ID much better.  Nice people at Quark, but I never used Quark again after getting ID. (For one big thing, you can’t live stroke text in Quark).

Overall I like Adobe. Tomorrow my CS5 updates for InDesign, Illustrator and PS should arrive. (Been delayed from MacMall). I’ve read everything I can find on what’s NEW in ID. Using CS3, I skipped CS4 because for MY use there was little improvement. Sadly, for ME, I see little exciting change even jumping to CS5. I’m updating it just to “stay current” but am HIGHLY disappointed.

When Adobe did their grandiose CS5 intro on the 12th, I, like thousands, could hardly wait for the exciting new, dramatic, product line changes! BUT, other than PS, it was a huge let down. Their marketing was way ahead of their product enhancements.

Adobe now makes about “1,000” different programs. Everybody knows that they could easily combine many of them. But, their marketing guru’s have convinced them that they can get away with breaking these programs up into MANY at $800-$1,000 each and that’s the way to go. You can’t argue with success - for THEM! But, what about the users? Times are tougher now. Everybody knows that Adobe keeps holding back adding features to certain programs so that you will have to buy one of their OTHER programs.

What I’d like to see in ID: More PS features and text manipulation. There’s a little program called Art Text 2 for Macs. It sells for about $30. An absolutely GREAT program. Some of what it can do would be so great in ID.

How about an InDesign Extended which would add great effects, text manipulation, 3d, etc? Now, wouldn’t that be a THRILLING update?

[BobLevine]

Different strokes...

Seriously, though. There's no way to keep everyone happy and InDesign is first and foremost a pagelayout application. But the definition of a page has certainly changed throughout the years and is no longer just ink on paper.

Before getting down the enhancements, I encourage you to use the application for awhile.

I have a top ten list for CS4 and CS5 on my website.

Give them both a read:

CS4: http://theindesignguy.com/cs4-thoughts.shtml

CS5: http://theindesignguy.com/cs5-thoughts.shtml

As for your conspiracy theory, I'd like to point out that Adobe is in business to make money. They do that by selling new products on a regular basis. I never understood why people look forward to new models in automobiles, TVs, etc, but when a new version of software is released, it's considered a money grab.

Finally, you don't say what exactly it is that you do that you find the new features disappointing, but the things you're looking for are in Illustrator.

Bob

[Mr. Met]

It's not a money grab but when you factor in the cost of upgrades, the suite really doesn't have a price since you must upgrade on an ongoing basis. But what people don't understand is you buy a license for the software, you don't actually "own" it like you do a car or tv. The licensing fee is ongoing.

[Guest]

All right...I'm going to pop into this conversation for a moment. Mr. Met, I'm not singling you out, yours just happened to be the last post.

At the risk of rolling eyes, I'd like to say that there is some perspective needed here. I started setting type at the age of seven, on a hot lead Linotype. (yep - she's in her fifties, guys)  The biggest concern then was getting squirted with molten lead or a stray matrice getting lodged in the magazine. Point being, typesetting was a job that involved physical labor and was a skilled trade. As typesetting evolved, I used just about every typesetter out there; including the Mergenthaler from Linotype that was one of the first systems that created typesetting by plotting X and Y coordinates for every letter or line to begin and end on the page and output was exposed film which was then cut and pasted up (yes, that's where the 'cut and paste' command originated -- it used to mean that you literally cut the output film and pasted it into position on a sheet of layout paper). Do you know how much a Mergenthaler cost?  It was over $50,000 and each font was over $1,200 per face (at that time there were about 64 faces total - you wanted something else, you went back to the type drawer and pulled out wooden blocks). It was not upgradeable and when new improvements came out, you spent another $50,000. (for example, when the Mergenthaler could accept text (no postscript) from an Apple Mac - you bought the new machine to do this because at that time, the Mac was only $4,500 (a unit with no hard drive but an extra floppy) -- so you could double your output by buying the Mac-compatible unit).

Now there was a great deal of resentment at that time because the Mac was a consumer electronic -- not a "real" typesetting machine. Our skilled trade was being invaded by youngsters who called themselves typesetters because they owned MacWrite. So, here we are today, using a software program that even at full price without benefit of upgrade or student discount, costs less than a single font face in the Mergenthaler Linotype days. Most of you are probably using InDesign on a computer that cost under $2,000. And what am I reading?  Whining because it won't do footers just the way you want it to? You mean you have to actually TYPE a few extra keys to get it to do what you want?  C'mon, guys, get a grip and see the future that will happen in your lifetime.

In case you don't follow the news -- ebooks are outselling hardcovers in some cases.  And how are they prepared?  In .epub format which doesn't support any of the niceties.  PDFs at least permit a cross between design and cross-platform accessibility while embracing multimedia. So before you trash that gentleman's effort at displaying his PDF ebooks, consider his pioneering spirit, not to mention the pride he took in posting his work for critics like you to tear apart. Print is dying - it is an economic certainty.  Design skills are not appreciated by the vast majority of readers -- they want content, fast and plenty and they want to be able to read it in short paragraphs set in sans serif from a hand-held device while walking a treadmill. You may not like the fact and you may see your job end, but it's what is happening. A decade from now you will mention somewhere that you used to be a graphic designer back in the days when you had to format your own footers -- and people will roll their eyes and move on.

Adobe makes money, yes, and deservedly so. That's what a business is all about.  If they don't make money, they don't create product and many of you will not have a job. Adobe sees the future and the abandonment of paper. They are trying to move you in that direction and that's why they made the CS5 improvements as they did. They are big picture thinkers. If you think they did such a lousy job -- learn to code and build your own software and when you're done, let's see if you're willing to sell it, support it, market it and ship it for $1,000 a copy.  Most of you can pay for a new copy with one week's salary.  That means you have a JOB and all the tools you need at the cost of one week's salary.

Get some perspective, get to work and watch the future before it runs you over.

Okay::::getting off her soapbox:::::sorry guys, but it just had to be said.

[Eugene Tyson]

The complaint isn't a few extra keystrokes. It's that setting the footnotes manually is time-consuming, this day and age I turn around a magazine in a few days. Having to set the footnotes manually takes up time I don't really have to meet the deadlines. And in 6 years this has never been improved upon. It is irritating and people have the right to voice their opinions on the improvements, good or bad opinions. We all have things we want changed, and releasing an upgrade that takes a half cocked shot at going to eReaders and calling it an improvement to the software doesn't cut it for me.

It's not really about having to click a few extra times to make it happen. The footnotes lose their linkage to the text, the footnotes won't move from page to page, the footnotes will not span across columns (tell me you ever had footnotes that didn't span the measure?).

All most people want is real improvements to the things that InDesign was built for, not a half cocked shot and an attempt to make it a web development tool.

[TᴀW]

Ah, licensing. I just bought a drill. It said on the label: "This drill is for students only and may not be used professionally. If you are a professional carpenter or renovator, you must buy the Pro version."

[Jongware]

Apart from the exciting (and some less exiting ) new features, can we have a round-up of CS4 (and possibly earlier) problems that have been fixed?

From memory:

• Footnotes (well, that's an obvious "no", it seems)
• Proper RTL support (was that also a "no"? Can't remember if it was mentioned in the vid presentation)
• Bad Word and RTF import -- fixed?
• Full OpenType support for mark and mkmk features?
• Footnotes crash in combo with "no last word hyphenation" (and I might be mistaken on that one, perhaps that was already fixed in an update)
• (anyone else ..?)

[Add.]

• Symbol font characters not getting converted to Opentype encoding

[Harbs.]

• Footnotes (well, that's an obvious "no", it seems)

Correct.

• Proper  RTL support (was that also a "no"? Can't remember if it was mentioned  in the vid presentation)

Same as CS4

• Bad Word and RTF import -- fixed?

I think it was fixed in an update already.

• Full  OpenType support for mark and mkmk features?

I believe the same as CS4.

• Footnotes crash in  combo with "no last word hyphenation" (and I might be mistaken on that  one, perhaps that was already fixed in an update)

Never seen that one...

• (anyone else  ..?)

[Add.]

• Symbol  font characters not getting converted to Opentype encoding

Not sure what you are talking about

[Jongware]

• Full  OpenType support for mark and mkmk features?

I believe the same as CS4.

Good answer  ... I can't actually remember what the exact problem was. I'll have to fresh up on that.

Word import problems:

http://forums.adobe.com/message/2620366#2620366 and http://forums.adobe.com/message/2615935#2615935

Decidedly not fixed, as I saw it today again on CS4 6.0.4; both "let's break the paragraph here and insert the rest of it at the end" and "now where should that footnote go? Let's insert a Replacement Character (U+FFFD) and have the user figger it out."

Symbol re-mapping problem:

http://forums.adobe.com/message/2360336#2360336

Happened only last week, also on a fully updated '4.

Footnote in combination with "Hyphenate Across Columns" off:

http://forums.adobe.com/message/1294733#1294733 (hey! it mentions CS3! oh okay, I admit -- I don't know if that ever got fixed for '4, as I never used it anyway)

[Harbs.]

Theun,

If you would like to send me a sample file which has the import problem and one that has the mapping problem, I'll be happy to test in CS5 and see if it's fixed.

Harbs

[Jongware]

Yes, please!! I still have the bad-import file I sent to Adobe Tech Support. It's at work, though, so it'll take a day. (And if you're feeling for a laff, I could send you their answer as well.)

I can also produce a bad-Symbol file for you -- one that demonstrably imports correctly into CS3 but not into CS4.

I do hope not everyone at Adobe's have been discussin' and votin' on just the new features, past one and a half year

[Harbs.]

You have my email. Right?

I'm going to sleep now, but I'll look at it in the morning...

Harbs

[Jongware]

¡Si! Full of anticipation, hoping the best, etc., & I bid you a good night.