QuarkXpress 6 some way off ?
As promised in the QuarkXpress thread, I did some digging around the Quark Xtension companies to find out if they know when Quark for OS X will ship.
Well, it WILL be called version 6, and although Quark demoed a beta version last year at Macworld New York, my sources tell me that they haven't even received a Beta from Quark yet and don't have any release date on it, either.
This is causing problems for Quark Xtension developers, as many prefer to test their products on shipping versions of Quark, rather than Beta versions.
This a BIG problem for Apple, as DTP and Quark are one of Apple's few remaining strongholds.
At the May 2002 Apple worldwide developer conference, Apple indicated that there were about 1 million Macs running OS X, which is around 5% - not actually a huge figure. Even if this rises to 10% by the end of this year, it still means 90% of Apple Macs are running OS9 (or earlier!). This isn?t just down to users not having the latest hardware - many repro bureau and printers are putting off upgrading because Quark is integral to their workflow, and many Quark Xtensions are custom-made for certain tasks and not available for any other software OR platform. And running Quark in Classic isn?t optimal - Quark 5 actually runs better than 4, although in either the graphics are a bit sluggish. And some Xtensions aren?t even available for Quark 5 ! I think many Xtension companies are holding back for 6, since Quark has already indicated that Xtensions will have to be re-written - after re-writing Xtensions to work in QuakXpress 5 !
Quark?s reason (excuse) for the delay is that key parts of OS X aren?t up to scratch - specifically printing support, which is true, although it?s also a bit chicken-and-egg - many RIP manufacturers haven?t updated their software since Quark isn?t native ! Jaguar supports the Common UNIX Printing System (CUPS), which supports IPP as well as LPD and JetDirect - presumably it will also support legacy apple-network printers, too.
So basically, we have to wait - hopefully, with the release of Jaguar and its new printing support, we may see some indications from Quark. But I can certainly see a lot of designers, especially those not in repro situations, moving over to InDesign 2..... I bet Adobe pleased !
Well, it WILL be called version 6, and although Quark demoed a beta version last year at Macworld New York, my sources tell me that they haven't even received a Beta from Quark yet and don't have any release date on it, either.
This is causing problems for Quark Xtension developers, as many prefer to test their products on shipping versions of Quark, rather than Beta versions.
This a BIG problem for Apple, as DTP and Quark are one of Apple's few remaining strongholds.
At the May 2002 Apple worldwide developer conference, Apple indicated that there were about 1 million Macs running OS X, which is around 5% - not actually a huge figure. Even if this rises to 10% by the end of this year, it still means 90% of Apple Macs are running OS9 (or earlier!). This isn?t just down to users not having the latest hardware - many repro bureau and printers are putting off upgrading because Quark is integral to their workflow, and many Quark Xtensions are custom-made for certain tasks and not available for any other software OR platform. And running Quark in Classic isn?t optimal - Quark 5 actually runs better than 4, although in either the graphics are a bit sluggish. And some Xtensions aren?t even available for Quark 5 ! I think many Xtension companies are holding back for 6, since Quark has already indicated that Xtensions will have to be re-written - after re-writing Xtensions to work in QuakXpress 5 !
Quark?s reason (excuse) for the delay is that key parts of OS X aren?t up to scratch - specifically printing support, which is true, although it?s also a bit chicken-and-egg - many RIP manufacturers haven?t updated their software since Quark isn?t native ! Jaguar supports the Common UNIX Printing System (CUPS), which supports IPP as well as LPD and JetDirect - presumably it will also support legacy apple-network printers, too.
So basically, we have to wait - hopefully, with the release of Jaguar and its new printing support, we may see some indications from Quark. But I can certainly see a lot of designers, especially those not in repro situations, moving over to InDesign 2..... I bet Adobe pleased !
Comments
So while we'll have Quark6 OSX native, many companies will have to keep at least one machine running OS9.2 and all of the others will be running OSx and Quark6. By that time Adobe(if they're smart enough) will have another version of InDesign that is absolutely rock solid, and every bug has been worked out. Then, if that's the case, why use buggy Quark.
?Quark6 in 1 to 2 years time will take on the status of pagemaker(as it is now)
?Quark4 will be used just as much(on an OS9.2 machine) as Quark6.
? Pagemaker will become even less used,
?InDesign will be where Quark was before ID2 came out(only better in alot of ways).
Quark missed the boat on this one real bad <img src="graemlins/oyvey.gif" border="0" alt="[No]" /> . And all of this blaming apple is absolute crap. Adobe somehow managed to get a product out the door that will print "reliably". And alot of other applications can print from OSX. And besides that's only one aspect of Quark.
consider everything in quark to be a module. Placing tiff files is a module, eps files are a different module, type is another, and printing(while probably one of the bigger ones) is only a module. Yes, they have to check out that their importing of files will work correctly with how they are output, but if everything is coded correctly it shouldn't be as grande of a thing as quark is making it out to be. I honestly seriously think that quark is run by 2-5 people and they only do coding at night after they've come home from the bars.
Have you seen the list of updates for Quark 5.0.1? A new spelling dictionary, "enhanced" hypheniation, they changed a command from lock other layers to lock all layers, they took away a suppres printout checkbox from the web documents(which by the way are one the stupidest thing i've ever seen a company do), they changed another name in the quark cms, and added a shortcut to workaround their QLA iplementation that pissed ALOT of people off when it was released, and still sucks ass. Quark5 has been out how long and this is it?
But enough incomprehensible ranting. hey maybe in quark6 they'll introduce a way to export a quark doc to MS publisher.
<strong>
This is causing problems for Quark Xtension developers, as many prefer to test their products on shipping versions of Quark, rather than Beta versions.
This a BIG problem for Apple, as DTP and Quark are one of Apple's few remaining strongholds.
But I can certainly see a lot of designers, especially those not in repro situations, moving over to InDesign 2..... I bet Adobe pleased !</strong><hr></blockquote>
Those developers should just focus on creating extensions (plug-ins?) for Adobe InDesign instead. For now at least. They'll go broke waiting for Quark to get off their asses...
I agree above with what Dartblazer says. I can see an iMac sitting in a corner a year from now with Quark 4 or 5 on OS 9...taking care of what/whomever might still use Quark for DTP and repro work...
InDesign will continue to nibble away at the edges of Quark's huge marketshare, but for InDesign to really gain ground, Quark will have to really screw up their carbonized next version of QX. In other words:
- incredibly late (mid to late 03)
- buggy
- few, or modest, improvements
- barely Aqua
IOW, (as someone else put it):
The Mother of All Bad Carbon Ports
This is all possible. I hope not, but... If it is, companies should seriously, seriously consider InDesign. It's shame that already more can't, or won't.
[ 07-11-2002: Message edited by: Hobbes ]</p>
I will be as happy as the day is long if I can stay in OSX full time! (Unfortunately InDesign isn't an option for me due to our workflow within the company and with our suppliers <img src="graemlins/hmmm.gif" border="0" alt="[Hmmm]" /> )
<strong>...but for InDesign to really gain ground, Quark will have to really screw up their carbonized next version of QX...</strong><hr></blockquote>
You're right, but if any company can do that, it's Quark. These are the guys who barely got OS 8 platinum appearances into Quark 5 which was released for OS 9 5 years after Quark 4 with barely any improvements. Based on precedence, I am skeptical that Quark 6 will be anything more than a smelly turd of an app.
But to be honest, DTP shops move so glacially slow that Quark might have a better app in version 7 which will be released 6 years from now, and at which point those DTP houses will be almost ready to upgrade to OS X, now that OS 11 is out.
Quark is dying, and good riddance. For those who say "Uh, what about those thousands of print houses that have used Quark as a staple? They care", I would simply reply - quit taking it up the rear and use a product whose GUI isn't stuck in the 1980s.