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September 18, 2005	WTVN Radio • Columbus, Ohio Sunday morning from 8 until 9
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Adobe Creative Suite 2: InDesign

Adobe continues to leave Quark XPress in the dust, but (surprisingly) still hasn't caught up with Corel's Ventura Publisher in some regards. Ventura doesn't have a chance in today's world, though. Corel hasn't updated the program for years and it still has some serious bugs. InDesign is the future and every iteration shows Adobe's commitment to quality.

A quick start for Adobe InDesign CS2

Not too long after an evaluation copy of Adobe's Creative Suite arrived, I received a note from my contact at Adobe. "Would I like to take a look at the Total Training DVDs for InDesign?" she asked. Needless to say, my answer was "Yes!" and a few days later a little box arrived. The little box contained two DVDs that promised 16 hours and 32 minutes worth of training. Hmmm. Two DVDs. More than 16 hours. And the DVDs contain the project files. Hmmm. About the most video you can get on a DVD, even with compression, is about two hours. Two DVDs -- 4 hours. Clearly this is not a video presentation.

The trick, if there is a trick, is that the box is labeled DVD ROM instead of just DVD. Although I was a bit skeptical at first, it turns out that this is much better than video. I really don't need to see trainer and designer Steve Holmes talking; I need to see what's on the screen and this presentation method handles this aspect perfectly. The occasional scenes -- introductions -- where Holmes appears are noticeably not "broadcast quality" video, but they're adequate. For showing how InDesign works, the application is perfect.

DVD-ROMs cannot be viewed on a set-top DVD player. You need a computer, either Macintosh or Windows. The advantage is that you view the lessons and can then use the files included on the DVD to practice. This is a more interactive approach than you would get from a standard video DVD. A secondary advantage is that views of the computer screen are far better than could be reproduced on a standard television.

The introductions remind me of watching television news reports that are delivered to the network by satellite -- the video may not exactly match the audio. Because the introductions are short, this isn't a serious shortcoming and, depending on how attentive you are, it's something you might not even notice.

Installation was strange, though: There was no feedback at all for the long process of installing files on the computer. This process took more than 5 minutes and, had it not been for disk access lights (I was using a Windows machine) I would have thought the process had died. On the other hand, the installer did provide feedback in the form of a status bar for installation of the application, a process that took less than a minute. This is not intelligent design. But that's my only significant gripe.

In 17 major sections (250 minor segments) Total Training for Adobe InDesign CS2 covers major and minor features. Holmes also talks occasionally about design principles. Whether you're a new user who's trying to wrap your mind around the program or someone who has been using InDesign since the original version, spending a couple of days with these two CDs will be time well spent.

This is not an inexpensive application -- $250 for the InDesign sessions and $900 for programs that cover Photoshop CS2, InDesign CS2, Illustrator CS2, GoLive CS2, and Acrobat 7.

About the instructor

Steve Holmes is a print and Web designer and animator. Listening to him, I thought he was Australian, but he began his training at Ware College in England and then created Copywrite Stationery in Duxford, near Cambridge, where he worked on Jurassic Park and Small Soldiers. His clients include Warner Brothers, the BBC, Nike, Virgin Records, Pixar, Guinness, Daihatsu, and Marvel Comics.

He's been an Adobe Systems trainer since 1998 and he has spoken at the National Association of Broadcasters. He was Total Training's director of design and animation from 2002 through April of 2005. Holmes has been awarded two Webby Awards for work on the Words at Play website and is now the Creative Director of Energi Design in Sausalito, California.

Frames (text and graphic) may now be anchored so they move with text (Ventura Publisher and even Microsoft Word had been able to do that) so that as an editor modifies the text, the anchored object moves with it. And if you place a Word file that contains anchored objects, those objects will be anchored in InDesign. Not surprisingly, the locations are usually different, but the anchors are maintained and can be modified.

Another big plus -- and one that InDesign has had from the beginning -- is that the program looks and acts nearly the same on both Windows and Mac computers.

Footnotes are a problem with any publishing program, but InDesign CS2 has done a good job with both formatting and placement. Numbered lists are another matter, though, and one that will still need a lot of work in CS3. Formatting is severely limited.

For those publishers who write directly in the publishing program (some) or those who edit in the publishing program to fit copy to the available space (just about everybody), InDesign's spelling checker has been improved to the point that it's useful. It's now capable of dynamic checking as you type, so fumble-fingering a word is immediately obvious.

Another neat new feature allows the user to drag layout objects onto the desktop where they become XML snippets. From there, you can drag the file into another InDesign document, save it in a network folder, or even e-mail it to another designer.

The integration with other Adobe applications can speed design activities. It's been two years since Adobe introduced the "suite" approach to Photoshop, Acrobat, Illustrator, GoLive, and InDesign and the project, while still not complete, has come a long way. In an earlier review, I talked about Bridge and how important it is to making the various components work well together. This will only get better over the next couple of versions.

Adobe InDesign still creates the most visually appealing text of any publishing program and that's something that I said when I saw the first version of InDesign several years ago, when the feature set was severely limited.

The new version of InDesign uses a different file format, one that InDesign CS cannot open. There is an ability to save files in the previous format (InDesign Interchange) but it's in the Export dialog instead of I the Save. Even then, those users who still have the CS version must download an update to be able to open the Interchange files.

Oddly, InDesign won't replace two hyphens with an em dash -- something even Word does by default. This is true of several other automatic conversions that are available in other applications as well as in Word.

Despite my minor quibbles, InDesign CS2 is the best layout program available. Ventura Publisher, my long-time favorite, is available only for Windows machines and is flawed by bugs. PageMaker's capabilities are limited. FrameMaker, for all its power, has a dated interface. And Quark XPress provides far too few features for far too much money. InDesign isn't inexpensive, but it's headed in the right direction and becomes stronger and better with every new release.

Looking back to see the future

More than a year ago, I said that Adobe InDesign CS was clearly showing where publishing was headed, but I also said that there were several surprising shortcomings. I named two:

"Multi-column heads: Newspapers, tabloids, newsletters, and ads often have type set in columns, but headlines may span multiple columns. Ventura Publisher has, for as long as I can remember, made it possible for the user to create a paragraph tag that specifies the text spans a specific number of columns or all columns in the frame. Apply the tag and the text flows where you expect it to. Done."

More than a year later, this still isn't possible.

"Bullets: Even Microsoft Word makes it possible for the user to create consecutively numbered lists or bulleted lists. The only way to do this even semi-automatically with InDesign is with the PageMaker Edition."

A year later, InDesign can do numbering and bullets, but the formatting flexibility is still severely limited.

A year ago, the product manager for InDesign invited me to meet with several members of the design team. Some of the features I asked for then are in the CS2 release -- not because I asked for them, but because they were already in the design spec. I hope that the CS3 or CS4 version will include the ability to create multi-column headlines without having to resort to drawing a frame. I'd also like to see another ability Ventura Publisher has: That of being able to place text and a graphic in the same frame.

Technology corner rating for Adobe IN DESIGN CS 2

9 CATS: I'm still waiting for some of the "power features" that Ventura Publisher had years ago, but InDesign continues to improve with each new release and Adobe's commitment to quality means new features with few bugs. Visit the Adobe website.

How the Technology Corner rating system works.

Monitoring what's before your eyes

Flat-panel monitors have come a long way in the past year. They're larger. The color is even better. Some are even able to keep up with games or other applications that have fast-changing video. And the prices are attractive. CRTs are still less expensive, but there's a lot to be said for flat panels these days.

Even the CRTs have flat screens these days -- or many of them do. Flat-screen CRTs cost less, but take more space and give off a lot more heat. There's also the concern with magnetic and other energy that CRTs emit and that may or may not be harmless. CRTs also emit some UV radiation, which can tire your eyes tired unless you wear glass glasses or plastic glasses with UV coating.

Probably the only advantage standard CRTs have other than price is that they can be run at varying resolutions without image degradation.

LCD screens give you back most (or all) of your desk. My 18" LCD at home is mounted on an articulating arm that takes up a 1.5" diagonal circle on the desk (where the bolt goes through). Flicker is not a problem, but LCD screens are designed to run at their "native resolution". Most will run at other resolutions, but the text sill suffer.

LCDs are digital internally and your computer processes video digitally, but the output is probably analog. For the very best (sharpest) video, you would want to replace the video card with a digital-output video card and purchase a more expensive digital monitor. Digital video cards are coming down in price, but a lot of people still get acceptable results with an analog card.

If you need various resolutions, the ability to play games or watch videos, or want to spend less, CRTs may still be the better choice. If conserving space and reducing heat are important to you, LCDs are better. LCDs also consume less electricity, but probably not enough less to let you quickly recover the higher cost of buying the monitor.

Buying advice

Either kind of monitor will display a sharp image, but you're going to be looking at the monitor a lot. Make sure the device you buy is one that your eyes like. That's what store displays are for.
CRTs have a refresh rate (stated in Hertz). The rate depends on the video subsystem in the computer and the monitor. Old monitors used to refresh at 60Hz and many people found that the flickering gave them headaches. Women are more likely to notice the flicker than men. Most men stop seeing it when the refresh rate is 70Hz or higher. Some women can still see it at 80Hz, but virtually nobody reports being able to see flicker when refresh is 85Hz or faster. Some monitors exceed 100Hz. LCDs don't care about the refresh rate. The video subsystem can be set at 60Hz and you won't see any flicker because of the way the monitor works. This is what works against the monitor in displaying video that moves, by the way, so it's not universally good or bad -- it just is.
If you decide to buy an LCD monitor make sure that you see it running at its native resolution and that you're happy with the way text and applications look. You wont want to change the resolution once you get it home.
The most important part of the process is letting your EYES be the judge.

You can get it on Ebay

Ebay will acquire Skype Technologies of Luxembourg for approximately $2.6 billion in cash and Ebay stock. The company says the acquisition will strengthen their global marketplace and make new lines of business available to the company.

Analysts suggest that it's a win for Skype, which could increase its leadership in Internet voice communications. The three players -- Skype, Ebay, and PayPal -- are in position to provide the tools needed for international e-commerce.

Skype is 3 years old. The company's software allows anyone with an Internet connection to speak to anyone else who has an Internet connection. A premium service allows Skype users to communicate with users of plain old telephone system (POTS) devices and cell phones.

Skype has 54 million users in 225 countries.

Nerdly News

FCC extends VoIP 911 deadline ... again

The Federal Communications Commission has given Internet telephone service providers another month for their customers to acknowledge awareness of the limitations of dialing 911 from a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) based telephone. Earlier the FCC had announced that VoIP providers would have to shut off service entirely for those who hadn't yet responded.

Apparently cooler heads at the FCC realized that, in an emergency, some phone is better than no phone and that cutting service to make a point might not be in the best interests of the people they're supposedly trying to protect.

In June, the FCC said that it would require VoIP providers to add 911 service within 120 days and that the providers were required to advise every subscriber by July 29 that 911 service may not be available through the VoIP service. The FCC told providers that they would be required to receive an acknowledgement from users that they had read the warning.

In July 26, the FCC delayed the cut-off date until the end of August. At that time, VoIP providers were to disconnect all subscribers who had not replied.

Now the FCC has extended the deadline to September 28. About 2.5 million people in the US use VoIP.

It's getting to be like the old days

Another browser will soon be available. Windows users currently can choose from an antique Internet Explorer, Opera, Mozilla, Firefox, and a few others. Mac users have all those (except their version of Explorer is even older) along with a special OS X browser from Mozilla and Apple's own Safari. Now comes Flock from Bart Decrem.

Well, not quite yet. But soon. According to "Wired", a small group in Palo Alto, most of them former Mozilla Foundation workers, have been preparing the latest open-source browser that's based on Firefox.

Flock will be different from all other browsers in that it will work with Web services such as Flickr and Technorati. It will also include built-in blogging tools. Wired quotes Decrem as saying that browsers have changed little over the years and that "Web 2.0 is a stream of events, people and connections" that call for a better browser.

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September 18, 2005