Apple Responds to Adobe

Thargok333 writes "Apple calls out Adobe on the 'PC is Faster' article linked from the Adobe website. They state that it is an After Effects bug, which they are working close to Adobe to fix. With Adobe's idea of G4 optimization, I am not impressed that a 'single 1.25 GHz G3' gets beat by a P4 3 GHz."

Comments

Honest question

[mcgroarty]

Honest question for the folks who believe the Mac should be faster...

These are bus bandwidth-intensive operations. Given that the fastest Mac has DDR266 memory and it's not banked for parallel access or otherwise arranged for additional benefit, what aspect of the G4 architecture do you believe should be giving it an edge in these bandwidth-constrained tasks?

HZ

[dhall]

Quite often the argument is "who has the bigger number"? The PC processor is often attractive due to it's higher number versus... a Mac. Obviously it isn't an "apples to apple" comparison, different architectures rarely are.

The number of cycles for your pipeline, versus the number of concurrent threads of execution through the same pipelines?

I've always considered the intel family to be a very racy and fast sports cars. Versus other processors which tend to be a little slower trucks. They don't go as fast, but they carry more payload. In today's market of "multi-tasking", well written programs can take advantage of a processor that doesn't get bogged down with "stalled" pipes. Also the frequency can only be "cranked up" so high...

There is also a focus on where is Adobe commiting their development work. There is a lot to be said for programs written and developed natively, versus those which must be ported over to other platforms. Carmack originally developed on the Mac first for Q3, due to the inherent limitations for that platform. That made porting it to Linux and Windows much easier.

Too often the HZ on the processor is used as a crutch to explain away the lack of development know-how (or lack of funding) for multiple Operating Systems. There are so many products on the market today that are only support on 2k/NT. Sadly any port to another OS is dismally lacking... and the platform is blamed for this.

Is Adobe still focusing the majority of their development on Apple? Was the conversion from OS9 to OSX too difficult for them to handle? Are they writing native code? I think it was reckless for Adobe to make the blanket statement that PC is faster, and sounds more like some internal pissing match between the companies.

Lies, damned lies, and statistics.

[esome]

Seriously though, whatever you make of the original benchmarks, they were oviously a thorn in Apple's side or they wouldn't have responded.

Re:Wow!

[IAmATuringMachine!]

I think the point is that the G4 is essentially a G3 with an Altivec unit, and that Adobe's Altivec optimizations are quite crap. Similarly, their dual processor optimizations are also qutie crap. Thus, even though the actual machine was a 2x1.25 GHz G4, to AE it performed as would a 1x1.25 GHz G3.

QED

Well hell...

[PrimeWaveZ]

I think that Adobe is quite lazy. Why you ask?

I've heard that a good amount of the base code in their products is in Pascal. While I don't know if this is true, it would also imply a helluva lot of 68k code still lurking about in their software. Going through both 68k emulation as well as another compatibility API is just bad. I hope this is not the case.

Also, could one think that they are not optimizing their new PPC Carbon/Cocoa code as much for the platform? Surely the difference between a coder and a good coder could be measured in application performance, at least somewhat. While I hate math, getting better performance takes finding the time-consuming calculations and reducing it all to the easiest possible operations.

Why not put some thought into making performance better rather than making gee-whiz features that most folks never asked for.

And that Apple has been able to tweak MUCH better performance and features out of products like the Final Cut series shows that it CAN be done. Is Adobe really wanting to spend the time and effort it needs to in order to get performance to an acceptable level?

God forbid, someone might have to write some stuff in ASM to get results. Blasphemy!

As Vince Lombardi once said:
"You can't make a chicken sandwich out of chicken shit."

equality?

[mbbac]

Why was the prior article on this displayed on the front page, but this one only shows up under Apple?

Re:equality?

[DansnBear]

I agree. Adobe had their spotlight on the front page for bashing Apple. It even got about 842 comments. Now this response to it is hidden on the Apple page of Slashdot. This seems like a retraction a newspaper had to print on a cover story, and put it on the 17th page where no one will see it.

Re:equality?

[mbbac]

That was the exact analogy I had in mind when writing my original post!

You'd think that Slashdot would want to present both sides evenly.

Re:I don't care about speed alone

[pressman]

I agree with you wholeheartedly. I use Final Cut Pro extensively, but I teach FCP and Premiere. Usually during my Premiere classes people ask me what I think of the program and I tell them that Premiere has it's uses but it is not widely used in broadcast television or film production at all. It is used mostly by home users on Windows or by Multimedia houses who don't need all the bells and whistles that Avid, Media100 or FCP offer.

I don't actually discourage them from using Premiere. It has it's uses. But if they're serious about video editing for broadcast or for film I recommend FCP on the Mac or Avid on the PC side. Premiere is just too slow and inflexible for harcore, deadline intensive efiting. Plus, exporting an EDL usually results in a total system crash!

To really sell people on FCP I just show them how FCP treats and handles a leyered Photoshop file and they just go nuts... and usually end up signing up for my next FCP class!

Not surprising in any way

[FredFnord]

In 1997, Adobe started trying to get all of its customers to switch over to Windows from the Mac. This was when the Mac was in a really bad way, and Adobe simply didn't want to support it.

Ever since then, Adobe has been treating the Mac as a second-class citizen. 'You could die someday', they seem to be saying, 'And we'd just as soon it were tomorrow.' It would be a lot cheaper for them not to have to develop two versions of any of their products, but until the number of Mac users in the businesses they sell to goes down, they can't jettison the Mac versions. So they've been gritting their teeth and bearing it.

And then Apple comes along and makes software that actually competes with them! WHILE they were wishing they could get rid of Apple. If Adobe were a person, that would be a perfect recipe for getting them amazingly mad. 'We wanted to screw you over, and were just waiting for any opportunity... and here you are, screwing US instead!'

Is it any surprise that Adobe will keep selling Mac software (because they have to), but use any convenient opportunity to get as many of their customers to use Windows as they can?

-fred

Re:Not surprising in any way

[pressman]

They sell as much mac software (unit per unit) as they do Windows products... except for maybe acrobat.

Mac Photoshop makes up the bulk of Photoshop registrations at Adobe. Sure millions of pirates out there probably have Windows copies of Photoshop, but the Macheads usually pay for their software and Adobe only really cares about the people who pay for and register their products.

Re:Gimp

[Cheesewhiz]

Look, as a graphics professional, I have to tell you, GIMP is a nice idea, but is hardly a pro tool. This is not because of any lack of features, but because the work flow of it is slow, and clunky.

Photoshop is the bread and butter of the graphics industry. Unless you essentially duplicate the interface and workflow of Photoshop in GIMP, GIMP will have a puny fraction of a percentage point of the pro graphics market.

If you're aiming to replace Photoshop for pro users, than duplicate it in open source and get it over with. If, on the other hand, you're trying to provide a free, sensible alternative for the other 99.99% of the world that aren't graphics pros, you've got a shot with doing things your own way.

But even then, GIMP can't yet hold a candle to Photoshop in terms of workflow, or feel. I wish it did...I'm as tired of paying $500 for photoshop as the next guy, but Photoshop pays for itself eventually because of its quality, and low-irritation factor. It just works.

Re:Gimp

[Gropo]

Just becase GIMP has a 'different' interface to Photoshop doesn't mean that it's automatically 'worse'.

Actually, I'd argue that that is the ultimate reason the interface is 'worse'. The reason being, it deviates so radically from Illustrator and InDesign that the streamlined psychological effect of switching between the "Trio of Might" all day long completely vanishes.

Photoshop is merely Adobe's idea of what a software package should look like - and frankly most Adobe tools have a *hideous* user interface (just look at Acrobat Reader!).

While You're entirely entitled to your opinion on this matter, I respectfully disagree (Acrobat Reader being an exception). Having been an intensive Adobe design suite user for the past 7 years, and having somewhat extensively demoed much of the 'competition's' offerings, I find Adobe's interface design to be the most thorough and ubiquitous in the design suite industry (if not the entire software industry).

I think a lot of graphic designers have grown up on Photoshop and maybe have forgotten how hard it was to learn how to use Photoshop properly and get use to it.

Any application, whether GUI-based or CLI-based, requires a certain period of familiarization. We need to look at conditions that alleviate the need to learn or re-learn methods of achieving common functionality between both OS-wide abstractions and abstractions found within other applications. Apple has covered a good deal of this ground with a wide palate of standardized command-key functions that Adobe has strived to adhere to for many years. To be fair, Macromedia and Corel have also strived to adhere to these standards; in my opinion, not quite as thoroughly as Adobe.

If GIMP could be rearranged to sufficiently integrate with an Adobe (or perhaps Macromedia, QuarkXPress) workflow, eliminate the perceptible "clunkiness", and add crucial functionalities found in PS (CMYK, Adjustment Layers) then maybe GIMP will find some adoption within design ranks. I am by no means holding my breath.

...I *really* wouldn't want GIMP to try and duplicate Photoshop's interface! It may be 'established' but, as I've said, I think it's a bit of a disaster from a Humane Interface POV.

I'd really like you to qualify that argument with some examples. If you don't have the time/effort to list them, don't sweat it.

I do think however, that the lack of a Mac OS X Aqua port is slowing it's slow adoption rate amoung established professionals.

I would tend to agree, assuming by "Aqua port" you mean a true integration with and adherence to Apple's HIG. Simply slapping a Quartz/Aqua face on the standard functions/layout/menu trees won't do a damned thing in that regard.

Re:Gimp

[pressman]

In the professional graphic design world, there are only a handfull of people that use the GIMP. It's a beast to work with because it doesn't adhere to any of the User Interface guidelines that designers are used to. It is definitely a Freeware UNIX App?! It has the potential to be very powerful, but it suffers from the "UI's are for sissies, real users use a CLI" mindset.

learning the interface of any Adobe app is pretty damned easy. Learning the tool sets is quite another matter. Photoshop and Illustrator are not for mom and pop who want to design a family newsletter. They are geared toward working professionals in the graphic arts, web design and film/video indutries. People who are trained to learn and use software effectively. People who, in general, don't have the time or energy to spend fussing about with a free program whose capabilities don't even come close to matching that of Photoshop yet. I know, I've been using Photoshop for 9 years and I've spent about a year studying The GIMP and basically, it's a productivity nightmare. It will remain a novelty for some time until someone or some group decides to really dig in and fix the app's interface and start putting in some of the features that present day users of Photoshop now EXPECT of an image editor. Live, editable type layers. CMYK and Spot Color support, ColorSynch support. Slicing and rolloover capabilties from and easy to use palette. PostScript Level three layer and transparency effects. The list goes on and on and on.

I hope GIMP development keeps advancing because that will keep Adobe on their toes. Maybe Apple will pull another Safari and make an image editing app based off of the GIMP codebase and REALLY give Adobe a run for their money.

Sorry to say it, but GIMP ain't ready for prime time production use yet and anyone who says it's in wide use commercially is out of their mind. It simply isn't true. They don't teach the GIMP at art & design schools where the new generations gain their application and design experience and designers are mostly a non-technical bunch. The GIMP is still an app for technically minded folks.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/07 64 53694X/qid=1048869038/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_1/104-397569 9-8879107?v=glance&s=books&n=507846

Now if you read that book cover to cover and STILL insist that the GIMP is as full featured and intuitive as Photoshop I will have to call the funny farm on you.

Absolutely true, and completely irrelevant

[FredFnord]

Fact: Adobe spends significantly more developing for two systems than they would developing for only one.

Fact: Adobe is in business to make money, and has, as most companies do, absolutely no loyalty to anyone except for its stockholders.

Fact: If Adobe were to stop developing for one platform or the other, while it was still a viable platform, it would earn itself enormous ill will, and someone would step in with a replacement. And a good chunk of people would buy the replacement. (Let's just not discuss the GNU replacement here, okay? It's not the point.)

From these three facts we can extrapolate a few things.

Extrapolation: Adobe will not stop making either Macintosh or Windows products while a sizable chunk of their income comes from the platform in question.

Extrapolation: If Adobe could keep all of their customers, while shifting development to one platform, they would do so in a heartbeat.

Extrapolation: The only way the above could happen would be if one of the platforms were to basically die, or everyone using that platform with Adobe software were to switch over to the other platform.

Extrapolation: Since they can't just discontinue their software on one platform without the above problem with it causing massive customer ill-will, the best way to bring about these circumstances is to make it more difficult to live on the platform they wish to kill, while simultaneously telling everyone how much better the other platform is.

Extrapolation: They aren't interested in trying to kill Windows.

-fred