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The Future of Adobe Fireworks

blogs.adobe.com

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Re: The Future of Adobe Fireworks

#41

Post by richforrester »

seanalltogether wrote: post #40
Osmium wrote: post #4

My first copy of Fireworks I bought when it was still owned by Macromedia and it was wonderful; so powerful yet easy to use. It was my impression that Adobe never really "got" it, or knew how it should exist in their ecosystem as a sort-of competitor to their other products. It was sad watching it flounder, but I wonder what Adobe could've done differently.

I feel like Adobe never really got macromedia tools at all. They knew they wanted to own the content creation market, but they never really understood the developer side of the content creation game. Fireworks is the last Adobe tool I use these days and I'm disappointed they can never understand why someone like me would continue to use it.

Adobe's own online presence is a prime example of how they don't understand the web.

Same goes for the decision to drop CS and continue with only their cloud-based services: they should've done that about 10 years ago. I can't remember for how long I've been saying I'd be willing to pay monthly for their programs if there only was such a subscription.

And I'm not trying to brag there. I'm meaning to say that it's ridiculous how slow they have moved. I've never met a person who didn't agree with the above.

I wonder how many students would've shelled out 20 bucks a month instead of downloading Adobe's software illegally if they'd done this sooner.

Re: The Future of Adobe Fireworks

#42

Post by ricardobeat »

The alternatives:

Sketch - http://www.bohemiancoding.com/sketch

Acorn - http://www.flyingmeat.com/acorn/

AnteType - http://antetype.com/

PixelMator - www.pixelmator.com

Unfortunately, none of them offers the blend of vector + raster tools that made Fireworks such a pleasure for web/UI design.

Most importantly, they are mac-only and there is no interoperability - they can't read from Fireworks PNGs, and there is no suitable format to export between any of them.

Re: The Future of Adobe Fireworks

#43

Post by kunai »

veritas20 wrote: post #9
kunai wrote: post #7

I'm a bit confused that they kept Dreamweaver but killed off Fireworks. No web designer I know even uses Dreamweaver anymore, but plenty of people still use Fireworks. Odd decision by Adobe here.

I'm sure that more cuts are on the way. Having a breadth of products works well for software that's distributed in a non-SaaS model. Now, that they have embraced a subscription model, expect narrowing the product suite.

It's sad that so many software companies think it's a good idea to sell a "service" and not a tangible copy of bits and bytes.

It's less hassle to buy CS6 once and be done with it and upgrade when you want to, rather than keep renewing subscriptions and be faced with product changes you may not necessarily like or want.

Re: The Future of Adobe Fireworks

#44

Post by gfodor »

It's weird they are killing this product because the existence of products like Sketch make it clear that there is a demand and a gap in the market for a good vector/raster tool for web design.

Re: The Future of Adobe Fireworks

#46

Post by as_if »

kunai wrote: post #43
veritas20 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure that more cuts are on the way. Having a breadth of products works well for software that's distributed in a non-SaaS model. Now, that they have embraced a subscription model, expect narrowing the product suite.

It's sad that so many software companies think it's a good idea to sell a "service" and not a tangible copy of bits and bytes. It's less hassle to buy CS6 once and be done with it and upgrade when you want to, rather than keep renewing subscriptions and be faced with product changes you may not necessarily like or want.

That's the trick.

You get the people to pay for all eternity ;)

Re: The Future of Adobe Fireworks

#48

Post by girvo »

RIP Fireworks: I'll miss you.

I started at 13, with the school's copy of Photoshop 7, building silly brushes by creating crazy polygons with 3ds Max and altering them (funnily enough, they're still online! http://girvo.deviantart.com/).

I then began designing websites, using Photoshop, and slicing up the image with ImageReady (great for making GIFs too). But I always thought there must be a nicer way.

Fireworks was that nicer way. I bought myself (with my pay saved up for months!) a copy of Macromedia's Fireworks, and lo and behold, it's perfect. The mix of raster and vector (although I had no idea what that meant technically, I appreciated it), the excellent layout tools, the brilliant UI... it was perfect.

And now? Now it's dead. Thankfully, I no longer do too much graphic design, and most mockups I create are done in HTML/CSS these days. But I will miss it.

Suppose it's all the more reason to learn the GIMP properly!

Re: The Future of Adobe Fireworks

#49

Post by brianmckenzie »

kunai wrote: post #7

I'm a bit confused that they kept Dreamweaver but killed off Fireworks. No web designer I know even uses Dreamweaver anymore, but plenty of people still use Fireworks. Odd decision by Adobe here.

Many Coldfusion developers use it, can't imagine many others do but perhaps I'm wrong.

Re: The Future of Adobe Fireworks

#50

Post by lessnonymous »

brown9-2 wrote: post #35

I wonder what the thought process was behind allowing comments on a blog posting like this.

That's an interesting question. While we're kind of taking the conversation off topic, let me speculate.

Imagine, if you will, that you have a popular product that you wish to EOL. And you know that people will not be happy. In fact, there'll be people who are downright angry and feel somehow betrayed. But you're going to do it.

These people want to vent their frustration. These days, they can take to Twitter, blogs and any number of sites like HN and Reddit.

But what if, as you told them you were discontinuing the product, you also gave them space to scream blue murder? And they would be screaming directly at your company, without even opening a new tab in their browser.

Now you've corralled at least some of the vitriol on your own platform. Now you can turn off the comments in a week or a month and all that venom disappears like it was never there.

Whether this is Adobe's intention doesn't matter. It's an interesting idea none the less.

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