[Macworld]

Post your comments for Review: InDesign CS4 here

[Okipedro]

I agree that the smart guides are a welcome addition. In fact, I wondered why other apps didn't offer it after seeing it in Apple's iWeb and iWork software. That's the first place I saw it.

[ThomasGanter]

Regarding: "This feature is so intuitive and so useful, you wonder why in the 25-year history of desktop publishing no one had thought of it before. I don’t know, but I’m glad that Adobe finally did. (And if you don’t like it, you can turn any or all of the three smart functions off."
Keynote was the first Application that featured this, many years ago.
You wonder why it took so long for publishing giant Adobe to copy this feature...

[moose_n_squirrel]

Smart guides have been in CAD programs forever. I am not sure but I think they were in Illustrator before they were in Keynote. In any case Apple was not the original.

[Inkling]

Personally, I think ID CS4 is worth the upgrade for anyone who uses ID regularly. It'll be about 18 months before the CS5 comes out, so if it'll save more than $10 worth of time a month, or about 50 cents a working day, it's worth it.
Let's hope Adobe adds another 'smart' to CS5--Smart Flows in conjunction with Named Text Flows.
Named Text Flows would let users assign a name to a text flow, so ID would know which text frames go together. That means no more fiddling with confusing blue lines. Smart Flows would then automatically assign the flow order based on rules like front to back and top to bottom. Move a frame, and its place in the flow would automatically change. Need to link text on page 20 with a continuation on page 87, as in magazines and newspapers? Easy, just assign them the same named text flow. Automating "Continued on page 87" would also be easy.
You mentioned Adobe's mistake in making text shadows and highlighting a frame feature rather than a text or paragraph one. They made the same mistake with columns. ID should let users make the number of columns a paragraph feature, so text can flow from single-column heading to multi-column text simply by setting paragraph styles. As things stand now, that's the #1 missing feature in ID. Seriously powerful sidebars would also be helpful.

[pakk99]

The new application bar is a complete waste of screen real estate. There is absolutely nothing in that half-inch monstrosity that wasn't already available in less obtrusive, but equally accessible, form in CS3. Once again, Adobe tweaks the interface for the sole purpose of tweaking the interface, without even the slightest regard for usability. The UI of an application should stay the hell out of the way. Period. Otherwise, we might as well use Microsoft's over-bloated and entirely useless approach. If Adobe continues down this path, we won't be back for CS5.

[Fixx]

I think smart guides have been in Adobe Illustrator for... quite a while. So not so amazing news but wellcome addition anyway.

[kevphil]

Fixx is quite correct about SmartGuides being in Illustrator for some time now. A little off-topic, but the recent review of Photoshop described the new capability to rotate the preview of a document as having been available in Painter for a couple versions. That feature has ALWAYS been in Painter; why it took Adobe so long to implement it is amazing.
(To be fair, Photoshop is supposed to leverage the power of current video cards to make the on-screen appearance of rotated images more accurate than in Painter. However, if you rotate the view in 90 degree increments in Painter, the workflow is more than adequate.)
Painter has also had dynamic re-sizing of brushes (another "new" feature in the latest Photoshop) since the very early days. Oh well...

[some_rain]

OmniGraffle has has SmartGuides since at least version 4. (Can't remember if they were in v.3 or not) That's the first place I saw them (and boy are they useful!).

[SCitron]

All this ink for discussing who had what first is a waste of time and digital space. Software engineers have been borrowing from other programs for years. So what? Galen Gruman's review of ID CS4 seems a bit simplistic to me. Is this a "must have" upgrade? Probably not, but that's because Adobe has done such an amazing job with ID CS3. Is ID CS4 an improvement in ease and functionality over CS3? Resoundingly, yes.

[jazzace]

I'm not sure why the reviewer did not discuss the biggest difference between ID and QXP: metaphor. ID continues to use a PageMaker/Photoshop-like pasteboard metaphor while QXP uses a frames metaphor. As much as I try to like ID, I can't stand the metaphor and how much it slows my work down compared to QXP. (Yes, I know you can make frames in ID, but that's not the way it likes to think.) Heck, I found FreeHand to me a more productive tool for certain types of layouts than ID. In talking with people at last year's MWExpo, this was the biggest reason people who chose QXP over ID were doing so. YMMV, but I don't see any reason based on this review to switch from QXP to ID, even without a large investment in XTensions.

[Fozzi]

For spell checking I would like to see, soon, rather than never, expanded dictionary capabilities. Nothing is mentioned about limits, how many entries I can check or whatnot. I also do catalogs and lots of separate publications which use proper names and variations of proper names as well as catalog numbers. I store them in the dictionary so that when spell checking I don't have to slow down when doing that. Unfortunately the 1200 or 1500 or whatver limit is imposed fills up quickly. Then I am unable to add new words and items later.
Also, years ago in the PC world, out of Cleveland I believe there was a product called "Xchange" which was the most amazing software ever for handling large or multiple translation tables. Not one or two items but many (I probably used 35 or more in some cases). By creating successive filers there were truly astounding manipulations which could be performed using IFs and other "programming logic." I see nothing in the Mac world offering such help except in writing "scripts".
All this XML stuff, at this time is too fanciful for my needs but I hope it works for someone. To me, Adobe needs to set out who these upgrades are for because as a publisher, CS4 doesn't sound like a must have for me.

[annemarie]

"ID uses a pasteboard metaphor while QXP uses a frames metaphor"?
A head-scratcher.

1. All text and imported images in ID must appear in a frame/box, just like QXP.

2. Both ID and QXP have pasteboards, one per spread.


"People choose QXP because of this (difference in metaphors)" ... huh?

[Zoopster]

A very good and thorough review. Thanks.