Adobe plans GoLive, Freehand support
updated 09:25 am EDT, Thu June 1, 2006
GoLive, Freehand support
Adobe today said that it would continue to support both its GoLive website creation tool and its Freehand illustration application, but skirted any commitment to future versions of both products. The statement followed a published report yesterday that claimed the company would phase out both products. In late 2005, Adobe completed the acquisition of Macromedia, whose product portfolio contained several products with overlapping focus, including Dreamweaver and Freehand. The report claimed that Dreamweaver would become an integrated part of Creative Suite 3, the first native Intel version of the professional graphics suite expected to be released next year and that Adobe would focus on development of Illustrator rather than its Macromedia counterpart.
While Adobe said that it plans on supporting both programs, it stopped short of a commitment to future development plans, saying instead it would evaluate its customers' needs. The company also did not provide any details on how long it would provide support for the applications.
"Adobe plans to continue to support GoLive and Freehand and develop these products based on our customer's needs," an Adobe representative told Macworld in a statement. The company, however, acknowledged the continuing focus on market-leading Dreamweaver and Illustrator applications.
A second statement by Adobe representatives yesterday said that Freehand would continue to be available as standalone product and that the company plans to release a maintainance update later this year.
"Clearly Dreamweaver and Illustrator are market leading when it comes to Web design/development and vector graphics/illustration," Adobe said, substantiating part of the initial report. "Customers should expect Adobe to concentrate our development efforts around these two products with regards to future innovation and Creative Suite integration."
ARGH
06/01, 10:32am reply
This merger is the worst thing to happen to me. As a GoLive and Freehand user, I'm getting shafted from **BOTH DIRECTIONS**.
Matthew Davidso
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Mar 2003
Freehand stays
06/01, 11:45am reply
I've read other articles saying Adobe is going to do another update to freehand... but golive is gone. They also said it would be sold by itself... this came out off of AI:
"While one Web report claims the software will also be axed in favor of Illustrator, Alexander Hopstein, Adobe's PR manager for central and Eastern Europe, said the application will remain a standalone product and that the company has scheduled a maintenance release of the product for later this year."
I think freehand is still in the air
migs647
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Aug 2005
Everyone is so doom/gloom
06/01, 12:46pm reply
Freehand is a great product, but Macromedia has never been able to do UI well. Adobe has some great UI people, but has lagged Freehand functionally in several areas. I think this will be a good fit.
Likewise, DreamWeaver is a great product with a crappy UI. GoLive is a nice product, but they took the Swiss Army Knife approach and tried cramming 10,000 features into it, resulting in a bloated program with an incredibly crowded UI. Putting a nicer UI on an already good program is another winner. I have been a GoLive user since Adobe initially bought CyberStudio, but as long as they port over some of the important interoperability features, I will not be very sorry to see it go. It is bloated and buggy.
ozoner
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Mar 2002
International Markets
06/01, 01:16pm reply
Apparently Freehand is more popular than Illustrator in Germany; while I can see the long term goal is to move users onto a single product, I think they have enough challenges with CS3 as it is, and it will probably be CS4 before they do a forced migration /make full feature parity.
That said, I fully expect them to stop developing Freehand as a way of driving customers over early.
JulesLt
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Jul 2005
I Win!
06/01, 03:40pm reply
I use Illustrator and Dreamweaver. For every loser, there's a winner. I suspect they'll roll some of the cool capabilities of Freehand into plugins or filters for Illustrator. I learned Illustrator first, and always had a hard time figuring out Freehand.
tindrum
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Apr 2004