Opening InDesign CS5 documents in CS3?

[jameskiavi]

I found this helpful article about how to open a CS5 document in CS3.

http://help.adobe.com/en_US/indesign/cs/using/WSa285fff53dea4f8617383751001ea8cb3f-6d4da.html

Unfortunately this does me no good because I need to have CS4 in order to  pull it off. I only own CS3 and CS5. Is there another way to get a CS5 InDesign  document into CS3?

Please help!

[John Hawkinson]

I was under the impression that Adobe no longer has a non-profit discount,

only an educational one. Someone please correct me, though?

[Peter Spier]

Adobe used to actually give away the software to non-profits that met certain qualifications, but I believe you are correct that things have changed. My understanding is that now non-pofits get the same discount, through the same volume licensing program, as educational institutions. I can't find a link that provided more info at the moment, but a phone call to Adobe would probably be productive...

[John Hawkinson]

I doubt there's reason to expect the discounts are as steep as educational ones, but see for some details. Unfortunately a lot of the steep discounting happens at higher volumes. But one should not fail to ask, it is true!

[Joel Cherney]

Adobe used to actually give away the software to non-profits that met certain qualifications, but I believe you are correct that things have changed. My understanding is that now non-pofits get the same discount, through the same volume licensing program, as educational institutions. I can't find a link that provided more info at the moment, but a phone call to Adobe would probably be productive...

I work for a nonprofit organization, and I'm happy to confirm that we buy volume-license Adobe products at educational-license rates. We buy, um, whatever they call software-assurance in Adobe-land; guaranteed free upgrades for two years on both platforms. The only thing we can't do with these things is downgrade; we only have retail media and the license-downgrade trick apparently only works if you already have volume media for the downgrade licenses you want.

(Which, by the way, really hurts when most of your clients are nonprofits or governmental; more than half our volume is in CS2 or CS3, and it's a huge bottleneck to only have the single commercial license for CS3. I got on the volume-license upgrade-train the moment I became aware of it, but only one version too late.)

I don't know if you can obtain nonprofit volume licenses directly from Adobe, but most of the generic nonprofit software resellers stock Adobe software at this point.

(Also: I also still have the very nice letter they sent us when they gave us free licenses for PageMaker 6.5.)

[John Hawkinson]

Well, how many seats do they have? Just one? Perhaps you can buy the

upgrade for them.

If you truly purchased CS5 just before the release of CS5.5, you should

have been entitled to an upgrade to CS5.5, which doens't really help

you but puts you on the same footing as someone who buys an upgrade

today.

I'd suggest you at least broach the topic with them of moving to the

current version. Maybe they're not planning on it, but maybe they are.

I didn't mean to ignore Peter's question about converting licenses.

I don't know of such a way, which means nothing either way.

To a first approximation, though, Kelly, it sounds like you're well

and truly pickled. Sorry.

Oh, and I guess there's the subscription model,

too. Not sure if that makes sense.

[nlafakis]

I'm actually in great need of anyone that can version down a CS5 indd to a CS3 version.  If so reply with haste!

Thanks in advance!

[Peter Spier]

I can do the conversion, but you need to understand that it will probably not be a perfect match. There are differnces in the text engins that will cause some reflow, and if the file uses any features that did not exisit in CS3 they will be lost.

I'm sending youj an upload link.

[BCompany]

There are many many indesign users caught in this trap. We can't demand our clients upgrade their software, even if we were willing to pay for them to do it. I am in this boat. In my opionion, Adobe could easily solve the problem by keeping lower versions of Indesign available for purchase even after they release an upgrade. I would gladly purchase inDesign CS4 in order to make the workflow easier between me and my largest client. (it's not an everyday issue, but it occures too frequently to rely on the forum for one-off help.) Problem is, that Adobe no longer offers a way to purchase CS4, even for their loyal customers who have upgraded and I refuse to buy a copy off ebay (too many disreputable sellers) for 5 times the price that Adobe charged for it new. I think this is a HUGE customer service failing on Adobe's part.

[Peter Spier]

While I agree that users ought to be able to purchase old versions if they also buy the current one, I'm wondering how you can characterize someone who hasn't upgraded each time a new version is released as being a "loyal customer."

[x-RayVision]

I know this was discussed uears ago but I've been jumping between cs3 and cs5 for a while now.  When in cs5 save the file as an adobe indesign markup language file. You'll see it under the save as options. It will open just fine in cs3.

[Peter Spier]

That's completely incorrect. CS5 can save .idml, but CS3 cannot open that. It must be opened in CS4, then re-exported to .inx before opeing in CS3. It has always been this way, and will continue.

[ChrisSGPnj]

In the same boat, have CS3 on one machine and CS5 on another, and need to move files from one to the other...

Saw Bob's solution...install every single version...Duh, That's Pagemaker All over again. I have clients send in PDF's, or I send PDF's...no more editing.

I have also been having to make everything up in Illustrator, at lease I can edit it on both machines, and it can be placed in either version...but that is time consuming.

We started with Pagemaker and Quark, but noticed especially when I ran a PM4 file in PM5 and it changed everything...had to keep each version of PM and had to ask the client which version they were using to output the job.

I was going to look into the plug-in to send the files to Quark, but the upper echelons did not want to invest that way.

The only reason i see people using ID now is because of the bundling.

Don't even get me started on CC.

[BobLevine]

Did you have a point to make or a question?

This thread hasn't been touched in almost three years. Much has changed but one thing hasn't; moving between CS3 and CS5 and back again is a horrible workflow and cannot be done (CS5 to CS3) without CS4.

[ChrisSGPnj]

Just the point...

ID is just like PM...need to keep multiple versions and hope they done conflict with the OS.

I had to keep 4 different machines each with the OS at the time of that PM due to the fact the OS changes required pieces.

Adobe doesn't get out into the field of the smaller shops and see what we have to deal with. They only cater to the absolute newest tech, and we have to do a majority of the R&D.