More than Word, less than InDesign

[RacerX]

Well in the last 20 years of doing DTP I have used Pagemaker, ReadySetGo, Quark XPress, MsPublisher, Ventura, FrameMaker and even RagTime, Word, AppleWorks and Nisus to lay out publications. So you can say there isn't much I haven't used to layout type.

I have (and still have systems that run) PageMaker, ReadySetGo, QuarkXPress, FrameMaker, Word, AppleWorks (& ClarisWorks) and Nisus Writer. And I spent most of last night working to fix two different documents, one in QuarkXPress and one in InDesign.

Given that, your experience is breath taking. ::sleepy::

Out of all of those I can safely say I found Create one of the most oddball and obtuse programs of the lot. It was slow, buggy and generally erratic and plain weird in it's functions. It lacks a pasteboard which means bleeds are impossible and the linking, styling and text flow defeated my best efforts at getting it do what I wanted. Maybe all these things have been fixed in later versions but I doubt it as it showed signs of being designed by a non-designer (an architect though he may have been).

And your lack of experience here is equally breath taking. ::sleepy::

I use a copy of Create on both a Pentium/133 and PowerPC 604e/225 and have never found it slow. And I get calls daily from users of QuarkXPress and InDesign about how buggy and flakey those (Carbon) applications are. On the other hand my clients who use Create seem surprisingly problems free.

Take it as you will. You are working hard to set up yourself as the benchmark of DTP, while all I can offer is a suggestion for a trouble free application and my mild DTP experience.

Lets just agree to disagree... on that which you have no experience with.

 

[rubaiyat]

Interesting. I raised only a few of the issues I encountered whilst attempting a project in Arabic, which no doubt you also have experience in. Other than dismissing them you did not address anything I said.

I also have extensive experience with people who say they do professional design work in all sorts of applications. I see the work and I see how they do it and, you are right, it is beyond discussing.

I take as my mark the example I was shown of a postscript drawing executed in Mass 11 on a VAX workstation. What the person who did it didn't say was it took 6 weeks of mind-numbingly tedious work arounds to do it. And at the end they really should have used a professional designer with a professional application.

Still I'll give you some latitude since I used Create a year ago. It may have changed but there is no real reason to keep testing apps on the off chance they may be eventually useful.

 

[rubaiyat]

To be fair and also out of curiosity I went back to check out the latest version of Stone Create.

I found this comment in VersionTracker, which seems to agree with what I observed:

Create is very rich and has great potential. It's wonderful being able to just put whatever you want, anywhere you want, on a multi-page document. But Create suffers from two big flaws:

Scores and scores of small bugs. None is an outright deal-breaker -- the app never crashes or corrupts! But there are so many old flaws which conspire to make the app feel unprofessional and clunky. It's like a car that gets you there but which grinds whenever you hit third gear.

Examples: dragging and dropping a copy of an item starts it WAY off from where the original is, and drops it a few pixels off from where you put it. It's hard to reliably drag & drop page thumbnail and have them ordered correctly (but it's easy to accidentally zoom to 800% when trying!) You can boldface a text block when the block as a whole is selected... but to make the text bigger or italicized requires that you select the text itself (something that precludes applying the change to 20 objects at once.) The page sizing, page setup and scaling work in some strange and non-standard way which I have yet to fully figure out. I have problems copying and pasting between Create and other apps that I don't have with, say, Photoshop.

Create departs from long-established graphical app conventions. Option-drag to make a copy, shift-drag to move something while keeping it aligned, option-shift-drag to do both... these fundamentals are quirky, inconsistent with each other and established standards, and a daily headache to work around. The properties palette is counter-intuitive - you cannot reliably select a bunch of objects and apply changes to them; you have to set one and then copy and paste the formatting. Colorizing text or other objects makes you stop, think, hunt and experiment.

The regular, free updates are great, but I wish the developer wouid hold off on fancy new (rarely needed) features for a few months, and concentrate on fixing what's already there and on tuning the fundamentals.

As I have said, I have used a lot of different software to do often quite complex and intricate work. They all have some strengths, which is why I choose them. Unfailingly though I have found they all have users who have such irrational attachments to their chosen software that it makes them blind to even its most obvious flaws.

 

[chevy]

FrameMaker is probably the most reliable solution for large documents.

 

[RacerX]

Interesting. I raised only a few of the issues I encountered whilst attempting a project in Arabic, which no doubt you also have experience in. Other than dismissing them you did not address anything I said.

You didn't give any specifics for me to address so I (of course) dismissed it.

I've watched people move from PageMaker to QuarkXPress, from QuarkXPress to InDesign, and most people like what they know. I, fortunately, know them all. I can work comfortably in any of them. I just spent the last three days working in QuarkXPress on a 70 page magazine which (hopefully) is going to press on Monday.

I had no problems working in that environment because I already know it.

I also have extensive experience with people who say they do professional design work in all sorts of applications. I see the work and I see how they do it and, you are right, it is beyond discussing.

You shouldn't be so hard on yourself. I'm sure that you are able to do mildly competent work. You shouldn't let the fact that other designers are more versatile than you get you down.

Beating yourself up over this is not healthy. Just try to do better.

I take as my mark the example I was shown of a postscript drawing executed in Mass 11 on a VAX workstation. What the person who did it didn't say was it took 6 weeks of mind-numbingly tedious work arounds to do it. And at the end they really should have used a professional designer with a professional application.

Which is fine. But are we talking about professional applications? I've seen ordinary people take 6 weeks to do with a professional app what a professional can do in minutes.

As your reading comprehension may not be up to the rest of ours (assuming you are not a native speaker) I suggest you reread the title of the thread. It sounds like you are suggesting that the starter of the thread should hire a professional designer with a professional application. I surely hope that you are not that far off base (though it sure looks that way).

For my part, I have never pushed Create (or any software for that matter) to professionals. Professionals are usually tied (irrationally) to some type of software. I've always found it is best to let them use what makes them happy.

Still I'll give you some latitude since I used Create a year ago.

I don't have any need for your latitude since you are speaking on a subject which you have no experience in.

I found this comment in VersionTracker, which seems to agree with what I observed:

I'm sure I can find similar observations about any software, that doesn't change the fact that someone who uses the software has a better chance of knowing the software than a non-user.

But remember, we aren't talking professional here. That poor reading comprehension thing is again coming back to bite you... the title of this thread is:

• More than Word, less than InDesign

As Create is designed to do web design, illustration and page layout all for about $150, why would you expect it to work as good as a professional web design app like GoLive ($400) or a professional illustration app like Illustrator ($500) or a professional page layout app like InDesign ($700) or QuarkXPress ($945).

Please read the title of the thread again. We need something that is more than Word (Create is definitely that) and less than InDesign (I've never argued otherwise), and as it happens cost less than both and provides an illustration and wed design tools on top of all that.

Create is a good recommendation no matter how much a non-user like you foams at the mouth trying to say otherwise.

As I have said, I have used a lot of different software to do often quite complex and intricate work. They all have some strengths, which is why I choose them. Unfailingly though I have found they all have users who have such irrational attachments to their chosen software that it makes them blind to even its most obvious flaws.

Well, it is good that you know your short comings and are able to express them so openly in a forum setting. I just wish that you would keep those irrational attachments of yours in check while posting.

But as you were kind enough to explain about your irrational attachments, I'll accept that as an apology. I can understand where your irrational attachments clouded your view of the topic at hand, professionals like you often have blinded themselves to the rest of the world. The fact that you can't put yourself in the position of a non-professional is understandable... and the fact that you are able to express your faults so openly is even admirable.

Thank you, and please post again soon.

 

[Natobasso]

What I find interesting about this whole discussion is that we are touching on the real issue facing graphic designers—everyone thinks that by buying InDesign or any other word processing software that they are suddenly a designer. Employers now think there's a "design button" that makes design decisions (and expertise!) irrelevant.

To my knowledge, a program does not exist that has just enough features but doesn't cost a lot. You either get full features or minimal features because there's not much market for a middle ground (though this thread seems to prove that a bit false, demand-wise). Why not either go balls out and get the full software and commit to the design process, or just admit that you aren't a designer and let someone else format your project?

It would be like me, as a designer, saying I can program the back end of a website in MySQL, Perl or PHP just because I know how it should look in the end from a design standpoint. We can all agree I need training, knowledge and a little experience to pull off any amount of that kind of programming.

As a designer, I know that the software and tools are more and more accessible and that brings the average joe to the table and increases awareness; and I'm all for that. What bristles me a bit is when people want the tool to fit their need instead of using the tool for what it was made for. Do you need a hammer to put a thumb tack into a corkboard? Definitely not. You just use your thumb.

In short, I would buy the software that has the tools you need and is closest to the price you are looking for. From my 10 years of experience, Microsoft's Word is a bad word because it's deceptively easy to use on the front end, when you are creating your document, but it doesn't reveal its shortcomings until you start trying to print anything more than text with it. Printers hate it, and I have first hand experience with this fact. So why use a program that doesn't fulfill its primary function?! This is why I say ditch Word and go with something else like Quark or InDesign. Even though they cost more, they are the right tools for the job.

Though Quark has lost me BIG time after its failure to support its own product or to keep up with the times.

 

[rubaiyat]

You didn't give any specifics for me to address so I (of course) dismissed it.

Ignoring the chip-on-the-shoulder vitriol, I did make specific points about Create as did the user I quoted. My experience extends to areas you don't seem to know about and one of those is foreign language publishing.

The original poster was interested in publishing for Bosnia-Herzegovina readers (basically Croatian with some Turkish words).

First I explained how to achieve the character set they required.

Second was how to publish their material with a less fancy and less expensive application, but more capable than Word.

I have done all sorts of intricate and oddball work using all the apps I listed and more. I also do templates for clients in Word and whatever application they have as standard (most have no choice). The one thing that quickly becomes obvious is that whilst I can work around the short comings of these apps, because of considerable experience, the casual user quickly gets bogged down in irresolvable UI problems. They usually screw up templates very quickly or miss the whole point of how publications are constructed.

That is why I suggested getting an old, cheap version of PageMaker or Quark Xpress (the first is easier for non-pros). They do the basic layout work in a more or less straight forward way. Objects and type go where you put or drag them on the page They both have better graphics & type control than Word. There are also ample support options and books out there when they inevitably hit a snag.

You may like Create and get around its idiosyncracies but I wouldn't push it on someone with a need to get a publication out and I have already detailed some (but not by a long shot all of the many) reasons why not.