ID3: Can the tab ruler line up with the text frame?

[Scott_Falkner@adobeforums.com]

Sometimes it do, sometimes it do not do. I think the little magnet icon is supposed to make the ruler line up with the text, but it frequently does not.

[Bob_Levine]

I've seen that but I don't think it's happened to me since upgrading to
3.0.1.

Bob

[Dave_Saunders@adobeforums.com]

The Tab ruler is up there with the spelling checker on my list of "is this really the best they could do?" items.

3.0.1 is just the same as its predecessors, Bob.

The only saving grace for me is that I rarely use either of these features.

Dave

[Bob_Levine]

Just a pleasant coincidence then. <g>

Bob

[Scott_Falkner@adobeforums.com]

Remember when Beta version were released before the retail version? As gone as rotary dials and leaded gas.

[Stu_Bloom@adobeforums.com]

Scott, I hardly qualify as an Adobe-is-always-right defender (ask Dave or Olav if you don't believe me, or just search on my name in the InDesign scripting forum), but I think your comment is well below the belt.

This application is not bug-free, but it's very stable, and that goes for all the current Adobe applications (except for PageMaker, which is an abandoned legacy app at this point). Compared to the app-cray that some software manufacturers ship, Adobe does a first-rate job of shipping production-ready apps, all the more remarkable when you consider that they release Windows and Mac versions simultaneously.

Let's criticize Adobe when they deserve it, but for heaven's sake, let's give them credit when they deserve that, too.

[Stu_Bloom@adobeforums.com]

Oh, and as far as the good old days of software development. Remember an application called WordPerfect for Windows 5.1? One called dBase IV? Lotus 1-2-3 Release 3? Microsoft Word 2? Son, you ain't seen bugs until you've seen them.

[Scott_Falkner@adobeforums.com]

Let's criticize Adobe when they deserve it, but for heaven's sake, let's
give them credit when they deserve that, too.




I do both of those. Here, I criticized the inability of InDesign to align the tab ruler with a text frame. A valid criticism, I believe, for the fourth commercial version of such a prominent product. The criticism is probably more deserved by the marketing people and executives who demand a product ship at the proper time, even if it isn't ready, than by the programmers who don't like to see unfinished product ship.

I also praise them, particularly for InDesign. If I knew who's idea Nested Tables were, and who came up with the implementation, I'd nominate them for a Nobel Prize.

[Michael_Savage@adobeforums.com]

Back to the original post. The only time I have seen the "magnet" not work is when my text box is at the top of my screen and the tab ruler wouldn't fit. Other than that I have had no problems.

[Dave_Saunders@adobeforums.com]

The problem I have with the tab ruler is just how dumbly it behaves when I am zoomed in closely. Not only doesn't it fit, but it doesn't align either. I have to do it myself.

The conception of this feature is at fault. Beta testers could have (and they probably did) complained long and loudly about it, but there's no way this kind of thing can be fixed that late in a project.

Then, when the next release comes around, fixing it has to compete with adding goodies. Sometimes an application will have a substandard feature like this for a number of releases because no matter how annoying it might be and no matter how easy it is to conceive of doing it better, it never makes it up the priority pole high enough compared to other new features.

For example, would you rather have nested styles or the best tab ruler in the known universe? Not that I'm suggesting that that particular trade-off was ever considered or even what might have been necessary. It is though an illustration of the issue.

Dave

[Stu_Bloom@adobeforums.com]

Scott, if you think this application shipped before it was ready, you've led a very sheltered life.

[Scott_Falkner@adobeforums.com]

Stu said:

Scott, if you think this application shipped before it was ready, you've
led a very sheltered life.




Not sure what you are implying here, that it did not, or that such is the norm. If the former, well, I just won't bother debating it.

As for the later, I agree that unfinished software dominated the shelves. It is this commonality to which we have become complacent I was referring to when I said "Remember when Beta version were released before the retail version?"

Dave siad:

...there's no way this kind of thing can be fixed that late in a project.




I disagree. There's always time to fix something. It's just up to the company to delay shipping until it is fixed. I do not think there is anything wrong with criticizing a company for its products' weeknesses.

[Dave_Saunders@adobeforums.com]

I didn't say there was anything wrong with criticizing a company for its product weaknesses. I have berated Adobe endlessly about the tab ruler, the spelling checker and the inane lack of a save defaults option (preferrably the defaults should just be updated as they are changed.

However, it is totally unrealistic to expect that a product be delayed at beta to fix inconveniences in the tab ruler. Sorry. Out of the question.

Dave

[Stu_Bloom@adobeforums.com]

There's always time to fix something. It's just up to the company to delay
shipping until it is fixed.




The product would never ship.

There's always one more thing to fix.

You start with a product specification. Yes, this typically has heavy input from marketing. Who else would you have give that input?

You develop a product to that specification.

Along the way, as schedules slip, management makes decisions: delay the feature, allocate additional resources, or slip the ship date.

When you're feature complete and the worst bugs are squashed, you go to beta. Yes, on occasion, if ALL the beta testers scream LOUDLY about something that's fixable given a reasonable resource allocation, you change the plan. But the purpose of the beta is not to gather input from users on what to change - it's to subject the product to real-world testing on a variety of platforms to allow the identification and correction of bugs.

Incidentally, I use the tab ruler frequently. Its quirks are no more than a minor annoyance, at worst.

[M_Blackburn@adobeforums.com]

I use the tab ruler frequently. Its quirks are no more than a minor annoyance,
at worst.




I would agree that the tab magnet's quirks are indeed minor. It does work as long as the entire top of the text frame is on-screen, and in fact, I don't even find the tab ruler not lining up it is all that much of an issue since a line is conveniently drawn to show where that tab is in the text. My major problem with the tab ruler is the same problem I have with all DTP tab rulers : there is no way to select a specific tab without clicking on it.

This is a more than a minor annoyance to me, because it make it too easy to move the tab simply by selecting it and sometimes rather than selecting the tab another tab is inserted. It all relies too heavily on the view's scale.