Adobe, maker of the seemingly ubiquitous Acrobat software, is to buy rival Macromedia for $3.4billion (£1.8billion) in shares as the number of players in the sector falls further.

full story... (http://www.money.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2005/04/19/cnadobe19.xml&menuId=242&sSheet=/money/2005/04/19/ixfrontcity.html)

Interesting stuff, I only hope they don't mess it up. I like Photoshop of course, but Acrobat Reader is a real nightmare, so slow and way OTT if you just want to view .pdf files (try using FoxIT instead).

I read this earlier today and the price was $4.1billion :o

I don't like the idea personally. Adobe products tend to be way OTT on the £ front IMO.

isnt the full version of adobe somthing like 350 quid or was it just a nightmare ive the basic version but whats with the full version

:o

I'm one of these who prefers Freehand to Illustrator. I hope Adobe don't bugger up Freehand if they get hold of Macromedia.

I heard about the buy, it's a sad day for quality software...
Adobe ar epretty much lame and Macromedia own the whole vector drawing/cheap animation corner...

Adobe Acrobat Flash Reader ? I think not !

I've been using macromedia software for eight years now its a real pleasure to use once you've got to grips with it.

I use Adobe photoshop for image editing and thats great too. I hope they can build on the pluses.

Oh good god!

I hope Adobe don't make a complete hash of Dreamweaver. I tried using GoLive once and it was a very poor substitute.

I suspect they'll try to shelve Fireworks in favour of that abortion Image Ready too. :suspect:

I read about this the other day, I can't see it being a good move, maybe they'll surprise us?

I use Dreamweaver and Fireworks, I've never got on with PSP or the Adobe offerings. I'll not be too impressed if they drop or radically change them, not that they need to. Maybe they could start by bringing their own products up to the Macromedia standard. Hmmm........

Originally posted by Lurch
I read about this the other day, I can't see it being a good move


Same here;)

Having used both GoLive and DreamWeaver I can (in all honesty) say that the Macromedia offering is far superior to the Adobe.

I can't get my head round all the options on offer in PhotoShop, so I use PSP 5 by Jasc. Premiere is nice though.

Originally posted by Lurch
I use Dreamweaver and Fireworks, I've never got on with PSP or the Adobe offerings. I'll not be too impressed if they drop or radically change them, not that they need to. Maybe they could start by bringing their own products up to the Macromedia standard. Hmmm........


:gag:

You're joking, right?

I hope the opposite is true - that Adobe bring Macromedia products up to their standard.

Fireworks is the worst Windows program I've ever used, and believe me, I've used some real howlers.

One thing, the only thing, Fireworks has going for it is the very useful batch processing command - perfect for resizing and compressing dozens of pictures at a time.

Aside from that, Fireworks doesn't know if it's a webpage-design or an image editing program. Try using it as a standalone bitmap editor, and you'lll quickly realise its limitations.

Another failing with problem with many Macromedia programs is that, like Adobe products from the early 90's (such as the horrific Illustrator 4.1 for Windows, the second worst Windows program I've used) they've tried to port the user interface directly from the Mac to Windows.

If I wanted a Mac interface, I'd sell my PC and spend 3x more on a Mac

:rant:

Originally posted by sccsux
Having used both GoLive and DreamWeaver I can (in all honesty) say that the Macromedia offering is far superior to the Adobe.

I can't get my head round all the options on offer in PhotoShop, so I use PSP 5 by Jasc. Premiere is nice though.

I agree with the comment about DreamWeaver, but I prefer Photoshop over any other bitmap editor.

I really do need like having the layers ability and unlimited undo. For this reason, I still use Photoshop 5. I see no good reason to upgrade to 6,7 CS or CS2 (yet...)

Imageready is a decent enough image-editing app. I'd sooner use that over Fireworks.

I'm with the majority - Macromedia always seem to produce quality software at a reasonable price and unlike Abdul I like the interfaces they go for. It will be a shame if Adobe start to change or shelve Dreamweaver, Flash and/or Fireworks.

Phweeeeez, Adobe kicked Macromedias backside big time, aside form web products such as Flash/Dreamweave/Homesite/Director.
Photoshop is simple the best bitmap editor, and Illustrator rocks aswell, these programs became an industry standard. Im sure 90% of pro's will say they use Adobe software for thier work.

Originally posted by Abdul
:gag:

You're joking, right?

I hope the opposite is true - that Adobe bring Macromedia products up to their standard.

Fireworks is the worst Windows program I've ever used, and believe me, I've used some real howlers.

One thing, the only thing, Fireworks has going for it is the very useful batch processing command - perfect for resizing and compressing dozens of pictures at a time.

Aside from that, Fireworks doesn't know if it's a webpage-design or an image editing program. Try using it as a standalone bitmap editor, and you'lll quickly realise its limitations.

Another failing with problem with many Macromedia programs is that, like Adobe products from the early 90's (such as the horrific Illustrator 4.1 for Windows, the second worst Windows program I've used) they've tried to port the user interface directly from the Mac to Windows.

If I wanted a Mac interface, I'd sell my PC and spend 3x more on a Mac

:rant:

Sorry I just can’t agree with that. Fireworks has excellent facilities and its tight integration with Dreamweaver makes it far superior to Photoshop for doing web graphics: buttons, rollovers, animated gifs and such. Its jpeg compression is also superior to Photoshop’s.

Don’t get me wrong here I don’t dislike Photoshop, in fact I use it all the time. But it takes far longer to achieve the same task in Photoshop/Dreamweaver it than it does in Fireworks/Dreamweaver. Fireworks is optimised for web graphics not photo editing. Photoshop is king for that task.

As for not wanting a Mac interface, what on earth do you think Adobe has given you? It’s only been in the last few years that Adobe has started doing simultaneous releases for PC and Mac. The Mac versions of Illustrator and Photoshop were miles ahead of the PC versions for years. They’re probably to most Mac-centric company out there, second only to Apple itself.

Originally posted by Fearful
Sorry I just can’t agree with that. Fireworks has excellent facilities and its tight integration with Dreamweaver makes it far superior to Photoshop for doing web graphics: buttons, rollovers, animated gifs and such. Its jpeg compression is also superior to Photoshop’s.

Don’t get me wrong here I don’t dislike Photoshop, in fact I use it all the time. But it takes far longer to achieve the same task in Photoshop/Dreamweaver it than it does in Fireworks/Dreamweaver. Fireworks is optimised for web graphics not photo editing. Photoshop is king for that task.

I will concede on these points. Fireworks may be better for web graphics if you're used to the user interface (which I'm not); but coming from a Print Publishing background, Abdul cares not for blocky JPEG compression or the sparkle and glitter of web graphics :)

ImageReady fulfils all of my requirements for the little web graphics I do, and as the user interface is identical to Photoshop, I find it easier to use than Fireworks.

Originally posted by Fearful
As for not wanting a Mac interface, what on earth do you think Adobe has given you? It’s only been in the last few years that Adobe has started doing simultaneous releases for PC and Mac. The Mac versions of Illustrator and Photoshop were miles ahead of the PC versions for years. They’re probably to most Mac-centric company out there, second only to Apple itself.

What I meant was the toolbars and icons of the Windows Macromedia and Adobe programs still looked like the Mac versions. Horror of Horrors, even the arrangement of menu items was the same. Adobe finally started making the Windows versions look like Windows apps after the release of Windows 95. Macromedia still wants to get away with making its Windows versions look like the Macintosh (such as Director for instance).

Edit - Please, if you still disagree with me reagarding the above point, try Adobe Illustrator 4 for Windows. After which I will expect your apology shortly after ;)

Originally posted by Abdul
:gag:

Fireworks is the worst Windows program I've ever used, and believe me, I've used some real howlers.


Macromedia (and the market) must agree with me.

After all, why did Macromedia bundle Fireworks 4 with Director 8 / 8.5?

Simple. No one in their right mind would pay good money for it :clap:

I am sure, that with both teams working together to produce software that will sell, we will see lots of compromises on both sides of the field.

Just because some Rich guy in a jacuzzi owns them both doesn't really mean he's gunna get rid of all the good bits.

It is however slightly worrying that the competion has been bought, leaving it to do a microsoft on us all. :gag:

Originally posted by Abdul
What I meant was the toolbars and icons of the Windows Macromedia and Adobe programs still looked like the Mac versions. Horror of Horrors, even the arrangement of menu items was the same. Adobe finally started making the Windows versions look like Windows apps after the release of Windows 95. Macromedia still wants to get away with making its Windows versions look like the Macintosh (such as Director for instance).

Abdul have you actually used any recent MM products, that was fixed a long time ago.

I've got Dreamweaver MX2004, Fireworks MX2004 and FlashMX2004 open currently and they all look like Windows apps to me? :loopy:

An besides, my program's better than your program so there! :P

I doubt Illustrator and Freehand will be combined.

Freehand is a very capable multi page layout tool with some pretty nifty dtp features, which whilst not qxp (thank god) is very useful for doing brochures, pamphlets, magazines etc.

Illustrator is an illustration program built around the needs of the vector artist.

If anything Freehand and InDesign are in direct competition with one another.

But freehand/flash interoperability is great - photoshop and image ready for raster images sure.

Anyone remember Xres? it was pants but had a neat oversize image editing feature.

I guess this means that Adobe and Macromedia are going to stop suing each other over stupid interface issues. Tabbed pallettes, honestly.

As a daily user of dreamweaver, photoshop, flash, premiere (today at least), imageready, authorware (not today) adobe type manager - they are just tools to do the job - neither has the monopoly on stupid interface ideas or really nifty features

-abdul - you can batch process in PS too and make mini exes for drag and drop batch editing

not a patch on debabelizer though, if you can get your head round it

I might just start using Frontpage and Paint, :hihi: got to be easier than all this :wink:

I have just about all the major graphics programs installed on my system for my work and all have their strengths and weaknesses.

If I want quick and simple photo editing I use Serif Photoplus.

If I want to do something a bit more technical or work with animated GIFs I use Paint Shop Pro.

If I want to do some batch editing I use Fireworks.

If I want to sit for five minutes to watch modules install and a load of credits, I load Photoshop.

Adobe have a major problem with getting their products to start quickly. Acrobat Reader 6 was diabolical. The program AR-Speedup was a Godsend. Reader 7 is slightly better.

http://www.tnk-bootblock.co.uk/prods/misc/index.php

Good things come to thoes who wait ;)
I never had a patience problem and besides once u loaded reader/photoshop once its much quicker to start up the folowing times untill u restart.

Oh well


so much for that cunning plan then ...

SVG represents a potentially interesting threat to Flash's market place.

Adobe provide an SVG plug in that works with IE and Opera web browsers.

How astute of them to join forces.

I thought svg is to be addopted for use as vector graphics format in the new windows presentation layer -> Avalon? as well as the internet.

Originally posted by Fearful
Abdul have you actually used any recent MM products, that was fixed a long time ago.

I've got Dreamweaver MX2004, Fireworks MX2004 and FlashMX2004 open currently and they all look like Windows apps to me? :loopy: :confused:

More questions? Am I being charged, officer? :confused:

OK, here we go:

The last Macromedia programs I used in any depth were FreeHand 8 (I agree with Phan; it's a very good page layout program) and... DreamWeaver 1, which in its simplicity was perfect for building my little website. It was almost what QuarkXpress would have been if it was ever released as a website building package :D

If Macromedia have finally started designing their user interfaces with Windows users in mind, then I am delighted. I will still never use Flash and Director though; the ability to plan what will appear onscreen 30 seconds into the future is something I don't wish to worry about!

Originally posted by Fearful
An besides, my program's better than your program so there! :P

In fairness, I was only criticising the user interfaces of both Adobe and Macromedia products.

I will never use Flash, Director or FireWorks, but I will continue to use FreeHand and DreamWeaver when the need arises.

If that's all your questions answered, please install Adobe Illustrator 4 for Windows, and let me know your thoughts!

:P