[Framers] Final note about Adobe Licensing

Tue Jun 26 09:33:34 PDT 2018

Hi, Ken:

Thanks for the brief trip through memory lane.

As to InDesign as a replacement for FrameMaker for technical publications,
IMO one major obstacle to this is that designers, who are its target
audience, are predominantly *not* technical-content authors. The FrameMaker
community of users over the years are mostly technical writers who create
original content; they also apply these skills to shape the content
originated by subject-matter experts across the spectrum of technical and
scientific professions, and submitted to them, into usable technical
information. In other words, they're language experts, teachers, trainers,
instructors, testers, information organizers, fact-checkers, editors and
clarifiers, of information, and also technical-document publishers. FM has
been the right tool to enable individuals to do both of these complex sets
of tasks simultaneously.

It's not that InDesign isn't a good replacement. Since version CS 4, its
book and related text-control tools compared well to FM's. But, it's just
as difficult to get InDesign users to learn, create, and consistently use
paragraph and character text styles (AKA FM "formats",) as it has been
historically with Word, WordPerfect, FM, and others. In fact, InDesign has
named styles for tables, objects, frames (containers), variables, page
layouts, and so on.

But the foundational difference in the user base is that FrameMaker users
have been primarily content developers and InDesign users have been
primarily content presenters. Different skill sets, different intents. The
foundational difference in the use of the tools, I believe, is that
FrameMaker document sets are often created with the expectation that there
will be future revisions, which informs their design, structure, methods,
and organization. InDesign document sets are more often seen as one-time
productions. So, there's a cultural difference about ongoing maintenance
and revision, more due to the mindsets of the users, than to requirements
of the tools. It is possible to progress from FrameMaker to InDesign as a
corporate technical-documentation publishing system, but it shouldn't
become mandatory because FrameMaker was intentionally killed off.

Progress is always slow and fast, depending on the pain and cost associated
with it. Years ago, in the InDesign community users complained that their
print provider demanded they submit material in specific non-InDesign
formats, such as a certain level of PostScript, QuarkXpress, PDF or NOT
PDF, etc. "It's too expensive to update our time-honored workflows and
equipment. List members said, "Tell your providers that there are other
providers who welcome your preferred output and they are hungry for
business." One year, my wife and I each received our laminated and
perforated new annual wallet health-plan ID cards on letter-size pages. The
lamination covered the full page - card and huge blank area - front and
back. I suggested to the membership director that I received other cards
whose laminations only covered the card area, not the full page, and, with
rising health-care costs, asking the vendor to change could save more than
a few bucks. "They say their equipment can't do that." "Say other vendors
would love your business." The next renewals came laminated only over the
card areas. He said they saved bunches of money. Of course, my rates stayed
the same.<G>

As has been noted more than a few times, even the cost of simply upgrading
FM to the next release isn't trivial. Changing from one major tool to
another, converting legacy content, retraining, etc., are beyond trivial.
Staying with a proven workflow has lots of value. Nothing wrong with this
model…EXCEPT WHEN THE VENDOR INVALIDATES PREVIOUSLY PURCHASED LICENSES!
That's bad faith on a corporate level. Unacceptable.

My 2 cents.

On Tue, Jun 26, 2018 at 7:36 AM, Ken Poshedly <poshedly at bellsouth.net>
wrote:

> I may be a little off-topic, but here goes anyway . . . I've been using
> FrameMaker since 1998 when my company got version 5.5.6 and, as the saying
> goes, "I never looked back". We had been using WordPerfect for Windows
> (version 7?) and I personally found it "clunky" to work with, especially in
> doing two-column layouts (text on left with one-column graphics on the
> right; yes, it can be done, but it was never as easy as with FM). While the
> rest of the tech pubs world is now up to FM2017, my current employer won't
> upgrade past FM 11.0 (due to the "I-know-it-all" attitude of the guy who
> makes decisions about my group; another story for another day).
>
> Anyway . . . I recall in the early 2000's the fairly numerous posts that
> Adobe (which had purchased Frame Technology Corp.), was not really
> interested in upgrading it, but had gotten what it wanted (money from new
> sales and a huge fan-base) and was really trying to slowly let it "die on
> the vine" because Adobe really wanted to sell that fan-base on Adobe's own
> homegrown product, InDesign. There was always a periodic hue-and-cry about
> this and Adobe did wind up issuing updates over the years (although many
> still say the last good, solid version was FM 7.0). Adobe did actually drop
> the Macintoch version of FM.
> Some folks compare Adobe tech support with "customer service" by Comcast
> (the cable TV company). Solely based in India and sort of nonexistant and
> super-deficient even if/when can get someone on the phone line.
>
> So, nothing is forever and Adobe will someday probably deep-six FM for no
> good reason (just like NBC just cancelled the great TV show "Timeless",
> resulting in a HUGE online backlash about that. Lower-than-desired ratings
> don't seem to matter for other shows that still remain, however.).
>
> I'm old enough to remember when competitors compared their "word
> processing software" to WordStar by MicroPro. I loved that program and all
> its keyboard shortcuts (oh, wait a minute, that's all we had because
> mouse-pointers hadn't yet made the scene). Though it has a rockier history
> than FM, it is still used, but just barely. There's a great write-up about
> it on Wikipedia. (The FM Wikipedia write-up is not nearly as extensive.)
> And let's not forget the late, great Ventura Publisher which was
> distributed by Xerox but is owned by Corel since 1993 and is a mere shadow
> of its once glorious self before the Corel purchase.
>
> I wonder how Corel supports Corel Ventura (still available but supposedly
> last updated in 2002).
>
>
>
>       From: "Harding, Dan" <dharding at illinois.edu>
>  To: An email list for people using Adobe FrameMaker software. <
> framers at lists.frameusers.com>
>  Sent: Tuesday, June 26, 2018 7:20 AM
>  Subject: Re: [Framers] Final note about Adobe Licensing
>
> Program software, yes. Customer support and licensing, no.
>
> At times it feels like FrameMaker is "abandonware", at least with respect
> to the attitudes coming from within Adobe... a begrudged necessary evil
> that no one there really wants the hassles of dealing with, hoping that it
> will just die and go away.
>
> -Dan
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Framers <framers-bounces+dharding=illinois.edu at lists.frameusers.com>
> On Behalf Of Shmuel Wolfson
> Sent: Tuesday, June 26, 2018 3:55 AM
> To: Peter Gold <peter at petergold.photography>; Framers - frameusers.com <
> framers at lists.frameusers.com>
> Subject: Re: [Framers] Final note about Adobe Licensing
>
> Why does everyone feel that Adobe is abandoning FrameMaker? In the latest
> version they redid the menus and added a shortcut to finding menu items.
> They also claim to have fixed some long-standing bugs.
>
> My only gripe is the high price for upgrades. But they do seem to be
> working on the program.
>
> --
> Shmuel Wolfson
> Technical Writer
> 058-763-7133
>
>
> On 26-Jun-18 3:25 AM, Peter Gold wrote:
> > These recent threads about licensing and related Adobe corporate-level
> > failings, and the associated sense of abandonment that's been voiced
> > by long-long-long-time FrameMaker users who represent a community of
> > talented technical authors and publishers prompt me to think "Is there
> > any next step that Adobe might take?" Well, if anyone at Adobe with
> > any power to communicate with the higher Adobe Powers That Be reads
> > this list (or if any members have contacts with folks who have the
> > ability to communicate with those APTBs,) how about floating the idea
> > that if Adobe's no longer interested in supporting FM and its
> > community of users, perhaps it's time to think about finding a company
> > that would like to buy it. FM might be only a mere fragment of a niche
> > in Adobe's spectrum of products and services and income streams, but
> > to a smaller enterprise, it could be a substantial business.
> >
> > Just another wild idea. Anyone out there? Bueller?
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