Illustrator CS: Let's talk about the new text engine.

[Doug_Katz@adobeforums.com]

Don't know how to fix it. Can only confirm it. Really, really slow with area text of any density and length, especially if any advanced typographic features are applied.

[Scott_Falkner@adobeforums.com]

In the Type>Font Menu Item font list - they do NOT preview in the palettes




I think I'll mosey on over to Feature Requests.

[Cathie_Howell@adobeforums.com]

WOW. After reading this entire post I am certainly glad I don't use illustrator as a type layout program. Anything that I create in illustrator is created to outlines before it's printed. If I had a document with a lot of text in it, I would be using Quark.
So that brings me to my next question (don't yell at me!)
Why aren't you guys using Quark? Then you wouldn't be having all these text issues......
Don't get me wrong, I love illustrator - it's a great program, but I will never use it for text based documents that need to be updated.

:O)

[Adam_Peirce@adobeforums.com]

Even in its flawed CS form, Quark can't hold a candle to Illustrator's drawing and Illustration capabilities. Just try to create a die-line and package graphics in Quark, it just doesn't work. For multi page layout Quark or, even better In Design, are better choices. It comes down to the right tool for a given job.

Unfortunately, Adobe has significantly flawed the tool in the name of "upgrade". So unless you can work in a perfectly clean CS environment where you don't need to share editability with other versions/users the best bet is to stay with v.10 and in case you haven't tried it, use InDesign. After 13 years of Quark we made the switch and couldn't be happier.

[Cathie_Howell@adobeforums.com]

Quark is for page layout, not for making illustrations. What I'm saying is if I have a project that is mainly text, I will use Quark and just import the illustrator file. I design packaging in both Quark and illustrator. Designing packaging in Quark isn't difficult. You make your dieline in illustrator - along with any other graphics and then import them. It's pretty simple actually.

[Gary_Newman@adobeforums.com]

And InDesign is a way better tool for this than Quark.

[Rudy Hoekstra]

Luckely there are no (to me) know problems with Indesign, butr with Illustrator.
Our packaging exisct 80% our of vector illustratiobs, no need to switch to Indesign or Qaurk for tekt, just type it in illustrator, just like i do with tabels!

And magine your tabels from CS being broken in 60 different pieces when opend in AI10, thats allot of work to be done alll over again. And as a side effect the textengine from CS is slower than it ever was in 10...

So, where is the advantedge of the new textengeine ? 3D ? Nice, but don't need that at this time...

[Cathie_Howell@adobeforums.com]

We've been thinking about using InDesign - what are the main benefits?
However, we'd have to first check to see that our printers have it. Most of our printers don't even have Quark 6 yet!

[Rudy Hoekstra]

Don't mean to be rude or anything. But I think it would be best if you would start a new topic in a forum about Indesign.

This is specialy for the Text 'problems' with Illustrator CS.

[Cathie_Howell@adobeforums.com]

You're right, Sorry

[Eskil_Nørgaard@adobeforums.com]

Thank you Mordy Golding,

You wrote about Illustrator CS: “It's unicode-based, meaning you can easily move files between macs and pee cees without character encoding errors.”

Does Illustrator CS support the entire unicode standard or only part of it? I ask this question because you never know these days...

Sincerely
Eskil Nørgaard
Addis Abeba
Ethiopia

[steve_gee@adobeforums.com]

I could almost live with the non backwards compatibility problem with Illustrator CS, as much a pain in the backside as it is. But the fact that the text changes when opening an earlier version of Illustrator is a major flaw, almost enough to make me put my G5 on ebay and beg for my G4 and illustrator 8 back!.

Not only does text reflow when you click update, but it also 'changes' if you choose not to update, for example text that has been baseline adjusted.

I think Adobe have really messed up what was once a great programme, all be it several versions ago!

What is the point with the 'great new features' such as the lady bird brush, does anybody actually use these daft gimmicks?

Absolute rubbish!!!

[Carl_Beason2@adobeforums.com]

How do you enter text seperators?

Thanks,
Carl Beason

[kathyallen@adobeforums.com]

Mordy

The only problem I have is that SOFT RETURNS don't work like they used to, is there a new combination of key strokes other than SHIFT + RETURN. For example I have text set with a 12pt indent on the first line and a 6pt before each para, when I run a word to the next line using a soft return it half thinks it's the start of a new para. The line indents (which is bad) but doesn't put the space before (which is good).

Kathy

[Mordy_Golding@adobeforums.com]

I'm unaware of anything you can do about the Shift-Return issue -- it's been mentioned here on the forum before.

As for the Unicode engine, yes, it's fully compliant for the text of the file (not all of the palettes are unicode-compliant yet though).

:) Mordy

[Thomas_Phinney@adobeforums.com]

Although Illustrator may support the full Unicode range for codepoints of characters in the text, it is not fully Unicode compliant in terms of text processing. For example, it doesn't handle right-to-left languages such as Arabic. To handle such languages you'd need a Middle Eastern edition of Illustrator. I think WinSoft produces this with Adobe -- it would be called Illustrator ME. (I know WinSoft does ME versions of many Adobe products, though I'm not 100% sure about them doing a version of Illustrator.)

Regards,

T

[Bree@adobeforums.com]

Does anyone know HOW to save down from CS to 9? Is it even possible? Thanks :)

[Dee Holmes]

File/Export to legacy, Bree.

[James_Gomez@adobeforums.com]

Here's a question that I believe is related to this issue.

I had a person come to me saying that when they try to save a file in CS that was originally created in 10, a message saying "access denied" pops up and they can't save any changes they have made. When I asked this person to show me what they were doing they opened the file. CS asked if they wanted to (Update) or not. The person chose (Update). The file opened,with not only kerning issues but with charachters changed. "A's" became "e's", "l's" became "m's". When they selected the bad text and chose another font the text came back correctly. When they tried to save, the "access denied" message appeared. What might be causing this? Is this in some way related to the new text engine?

[Jackie_Wessel@adobeforums.com]

What you have done to illustrator CS is an abomination. Obviously you have no respect fro professional people who need to get a jobe done. Frankly, I don't care about your rational for ruining the type "engine" and I don't care if you say it is "better" in any way. What I do care about is that it simply does not work. When I import type from a previous version of Illustrator it gets all whacked-out (yes that's a professional term). AND WHAT YOU HAVE DONE TO HIDDEN CHARACTERS IS TOTALLY UNCALLED FOR. Is it neccesary to make the hidden characters so huge that they cover up the text????? Is it necessary to make them so ugly that they are hardly recognizable????? You have not produced a usable version of Illustrator since 8.0 and yet you keep moving forward and the program gets worse and worse. You have made my job so difficult and I curse you everyday. (See if you can guess what I think CS stands for.)