Adobe on Linux

[Johnny Best]

Just read through this whole post. Interesting subjects on Open Source software, Macs, Windows and Adobe.

 

[Bobby H]

Legacy files are very easily able to be opened. I have yet to have a problem with legacy files, either with Ai or CDR. Now bare in mind, I'm saying opening. I don't not need beyond that that what I do when I receive outside files.

If you're rarely ever having problems with client-provided artwork the stuff you're receiving must only be very basic in nature. What I mean by basic is artwork with flat object fills only, all fonts converted to outlines, no line strokes or effects/patterns applied to strokes, no transparency effects, etc.

It's a lot to ask of a client just to get them to provide artwork that fits those parameters; very often the person sending the art file is not the person who created it. It's an asset just being passed along. If it's an asset of a big company or recognizable brand you have to do what you can on your end to make the vector file work. Or you risk losing out on the project. If you don't have software that can natively open and edit that file it will create a bunch of problems. Adobe Illustrator is the industry standard for the mainstream advertising industry, particularly those fashion conscious Mac users.

When the artwork starts incorporating features and effects introduced inside the past 20 years things get tricky. I've gone on in detail in other posts about how CorelDRAW stinks at opening certain kinds of Illustrator artwork as well as PDFs. Certain things in CorelDRAW don't translate over to Illustrator either. Even CorelDRAW is error-prone at opening old CDR files (saved in versions later than V5 that the program will still at least try to open). Even 20 years ago I would see issues with jumping art files between CorelDRAW, Freehand, Canvas or Illustrator. Now the situation is more complicated due to all the newer fills and effects that can be applied to vector-based artwork.

When I receive files, I don't need to go in and tweak the file directly. I don't need that ability. I just have to open it up and I'm good to go.

I'm talking about just opening the art file properly and making sure it is production ready. I'm not talking at all about altering the appearance of the artwork.

I've seen plenty of PDFs that looked proper in Adobe Reader and then see all the fills get shifted into odd-ball soup when imported straight into CorelDRAW. I've seen plenty be a mess opening directly into Illustrator (hence the need for plug-ins like Astute Graphics Vector First Aid). Fixing a PDF not saved with Illustrator editing capability left intact can be a giant chore. And that's just editing it within Illustrator where things like gradients will still be in their proper position, angle, etc. Trying to fix a PDF like that in Corel is even worse.

As far as SVG files, they are exceptionally big in the apparel world (which is where my creative field mainly is), if you don't deal much with that, I can see why you may never have that request.

SVG files, just like PDFs, can be very very dodgy if whoever generated the files didn't do a little thinking first before hitting the "save" button. Most SVG filters will default to some form of SVG Tiny, which is every bit as bad as a web-friendly PDF. The artwork might look acceptable on a computer screen or mobile phone. But when it is imported into Illustrator or CorelDRAW the artwork can often be practically corrupted.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

If you're rarely ever having problems with client-provided artwork the stuff you're receiving must only be very basic in nature. What I mean by basic is artwork with flat object fills only, all fonts converted to outlines, no line strokes or effects/patterns applied to strokes, no transparency effects, etc.

It's a lot to ask of a client just to get them to provide artwork that fits those parameters; very often the person sending the art file is not the person who created it. It's an asset just being passed along. If it's an asset of a big company or recognizable brand you have to do what you can on your end to make the vector file work. Or you risk losing out on the project. If you don't have software that can natively open and edit that file it will create a bunch of problems. Adobe Illustrator is the industry standard for the mainstream advertising industry, particularly those fashion conscious Mac users.

Not at all the issue. I regularly deal with strokes/effects/transparencies.

I don't have to be able to edit the file in it's native form. I just have to be able to view it. That's it. I can even take a screenshot of that viewed vector file and do exactly what I need to do with no variation in workflow and still turn out a quality product

I'm talking about just opening the art file properly and making sure it is production ready. I'm not talking at all about altering the appearance of the artwork.

I'm talking about that as well. My checking to see if it's production ready for my type of production, I'm willing to bet, is far different then yours.

I've seen plenty of PDFs that looked proper in Adobe Reader and then see all the fills get shifted into odd-ball soup when imported straight into CorelDRAW.

If it opens up and views correctly, that's all that I need. I can take a screenshot of that and do my work if need be. My needs are probably not the same as your needs.

SVG files, just like PDFs, can be very very dodgy if whoever generated the files didn't do a little thinking first before hitting the "save" button.

That can be the case no matter what file format we are talking about.

 

[Bobby H]

Not at all the issue. I regularly deal with strokes/effects/transparencies.

I don't have to be able to edit the file in it's native form. I just have to be able to view it. That's it. I can even take a screenshot of that viewed vector file and do exactly what I need to do with no variation in workflow and still turn out a quality product.

Taking a screen shot and working with what is really just a pixel-based image of the computer screen rather than the actual native artwork might be acceptable to you, but it is a total non-starter for me. I have to work from the native vector-based artwork. Working with a screen shot would basically mean having to re-create the artwork in vector form if I wanted a high resolution version of it for large format printing or something that could be sent to a vinyl cutter or routing table.

Re-creating artwork has lots of pitfalls. It needlessly eats up time and possibly lots of it if you try to do a credible job at the re-creation effort. And then that brings up another pit fall: no matter how hard someone tries their re-creation of a company logo or asset will never be fully accurate. It's just better to be able to print, cut and rout from the real, authentic artwork.

Now, how you would even be able get a screen shot of artwork saved in a recent-generation AI file is another conundrum. That's only going to be possible if the person who generated the AI file bothered to save it down to the version of Illustrator you're using. Otherwise you could try to drag it into Adobe Reader and hope the AI file was saved with PDF compatibility turned on. As I've said repeatedly before other applications like CorelDRAW can run into all kinds of problems opening or importing AI and PDF artwork.

We'll bill customers for the design time it takes to re-create a logo if all they have a little JPEG image from a web site, or if someone goofed up and "designed" their logo in Photoshop only for the purposes of a web page. Pretty common issue. But if we have to take screen shots from a client's vector-based PDF or AI file and re-create that, well, that's not the client's fault. And then the re-created artwork is only a copy of a copy and not the real thing.

If it opens up and views correctly, that's all that I need. I can take a screenshot of that and do my work if need be. My needs are probably not the same as your needs.

When it comes to opening recent generation Illustrator and PDF files I haven't seen any non-Adobe drawing programs perform the task credibly. They're not accurate enough to work as a substitute or replacement for Adobe Illustrator. And that gets back to why some of us have to use Adobe Creative Cloud. If you can live without it, that's cool. But don't expect me to follow your lead.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

Taking a screen shot and working with what is really just a pixel-based image of the computer screen rather than the actual native artwork might be acceptable to you, but it is a total non-starter for me.

Yep, the only real advantage with keeping it as a true vector artwork is resolution independence. That's it. Everything else is the exact same process for me, regardless if it's a vector file or not. I have to do the exact same thing. Nothing changes. Having a vector may give you a leg up in your workflow, but not so much in mine. For my production, I'm recreating it no matter what format it's in, just not with the same considerations that I would have if I was recreating it for a vector form.

Now, how you would even be able get a screen shot of artwork saved in a recent-generation AI file is another conundrum. That's only going to be possible if the person who generated the AI file bothered to save it down to the version of Illustrator you're using. Otherwise you could try to drag it into Adobe Reader and hope the AI file was saved with PDF compatibility turned on.

It's amazing what tools are available out there.

Isn't PDF compatibility being on the default option? I could have sworn that it is. Unless that has changed with the CC versions.

But if we have to take screen shots from a client's vector-based PDF or AI file and re-create that, well, that's not the client's fault. And then the re-created artwork is only a copy of a copy and not the real thing.

Recreating a file for production is what they are paying me to do. Doesn't matter if they send me a vector file or not. My workflow is exactly the same. In fact, the source file being in vector actually doesn't mean that it will translate "as is" anyway.

Let's put it this way. Let's say you have a sketch that you import into Ai as a template layer to vectorize. That's exactly what I'm doing with a vector file or a raster file. The only advantage that a vector file would have is resolution independence. That's it. Nothing more. That's why people that actually do have vector versions of brands don't send them to me, they know I don't need it and if they can do without sending proprietary files, they will. My level of competence doesn't diminish if I don't get a vector file.

You may need to have a vector file to do what you need to do, I do not. That means that I don't have to go back to the client and ask if they have a vector version or if they want to pay $XX extra for me to vectorize it before I even make it into a production ready file (which is a separate file from the vector file).

When it comes to opening recent generation Illustrator and PDF files I haven't seen any non-Adobe drawing programs perform the task credibly.

One program that I use, actually rasterizes the PDF file, so that may contribute to that one particular program's rate of success. Again, my competence level does not diminish if I don't have a vector file at all. My process is exactly the same. Yours may not be, but mine is.

Although, I will say this, those programs that I use for this are not cross platform, so that may also diminish your ability to try them out.

And that gets back to why some of us have to use Adobe Creative Cloud. If you can live without it, that's cool. But don't expect me to follow your lead.

This has to be evaluated on an individual basis. If you can't, don't want to, don't even want to try, that's fine. Do what works for you in the most efficiently way possible. However, just because it doesn't work for you, doesn't mean that it won't work for the next person.

However, remember that this thread was actually talking more about having Adobe ported directly onto the Linux platform, so our little sidebar would actually be moot.

Now, I do not harbor a lot of hope for it happening, I just thought it was interesting, so I thought I would post it here. Last count that I saw, it was over 7k up votes.

 

[brycesteiner]

When it comes to opening recent generation Illustrator and PDF files I haven't seen any non-Adobe drawing programs perform the task credibly.

I use Adobe programs all day long and I pretty much agree with the exception of Affinity.

Affinity Designer has saved many files from Indesign PDF's for me. It opens PDF files better than AI (unless the PDF was created by AI). I'm sure that you are well aware of Indesign's issues of converting fonts to outlines -- especially script fonts. Affinity can merge those together in so there is no cuts going through things wrong in the vector programs.

I went to Mac because it is a Unix foundation OS just like Linux is, with the idea that it works simply and well. The applications are easy to install and easy to remove. I was a longtime Windows user but the UNIX/MACH kernel and simplicity sent me over.

Would it be difficult to port from one UNIX system on Intel to another Unix like system on Intel? No. In fact it's not that difficult at all. One of my favorite apps on Linux was KMyMoney. Since it was open source I was able to get the code, compile it in Xcode. Guess what, it ran on the Mac just fine in the X11 environment. It would take a little more, but still could be done.
Even though I would like Adobe on Linux, it's probably not going to happen.

 

[kcollinsdesign]

It's all ones and zeros. It shouldn't be that hard to compile a program that can read .ai files and interpret attributes assigned by AI. Adobe CC is readily available as a checksum. The cost of an Adobe CC subscription should be a minor concern considering the thousands of hours you will spend writing the code.

Or you can just use Adobe CC.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

It's all ones and zeros. It shouldn't be that hard to compile a program that can read .ai files and interpret attributes assigned by AI. Adobe CC is readily available as a checksum. The cost of an Adobe CC subscription should be a minor concern considering the thousands of hours you will spend writing the code.

You always mention having to compile from source. Don't have to compile from source. I've easily found programs that are either already available in certain forks or are a portable program as it is (some of which are exactly like the app bundles that Mac uses).

I wouldn't use this system if I had to compile from source for necessary production software. I either use what's already bundled in the OS or I use portable programs (no dealing with the repo at all (or App Store for the Apple people)). I can actually run multiple versions of the same program without issue at the same time.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

Would it be difficult to port from one UNIX system on Intel to another Unix like system on Intel? No. In fact it's not that difficult at all.

I actually have an Apple program that runs on all my versions of Linux (from KDE to Mint). No, not compiled either. On my systems it's actually bundled already.

One of my favorite apps on Linux was KMyMoney.

Gotta love KDE apps (my particular favorite DE). Although I do run Gnome as well (in the form of Cinnamon).

 

[Bobby H]

Yep, the only real advantage with keeping it as a true vector artwork is resolution independence. That's it. Everything else is the exact same process for me, regardless if it's a vector file or not.

You make the notion of working with vector-based artwork sound completely trivial. This is primarily a sign making forum, not a forum about embroidery. The vast majority of us do not spend our time creating stitching patterns from pixel-based images. Some of the production tools we work with, such as vinyl cutters and routing tables, work only with vector-based artwork. Pixels mean nothing to those machines. When cutting or routing the best results are obtained by using clean, authentic, vector-based artwork. Not some crummy, inaccurate re-creation of it.

The "warts" of re-created artwork might be able to hide in a stitching pattern. The same warts will show up far more easily in cut vinyl, routed lettering or large format printed graphics. You might have a good quick routine for creating stitching of every letter or object in a piece of artwork. But there's nothing quick or easy about having to vectorize a bunch of letters from scratch if the finished result is supposed to look good. It's a whole lot faster and easier to have the same typefaces the client used in the logo. The best thing is just being able to use a vector file of the client's logo and not have to waste any time re-creating any artwork at all.

It's amazing what tools are available out there.

Name a specific application that is a fully functional replacement for Adobe Illustrator, or even CorelDRAW for that matter.

Just between Illustrator and CorelDRAW both overlap in many fundamental ways. But then both applications do certain things the other can't do well (or at all). For better or worse Adobe Illustrator is the industry standard for much of the advertising industry. Graphics people working in many parts of that industry are not confining themselves to using features of Illustrator introduced prior to Creative Cloud. CorelDRAW and many other rival drawing programs have struggled just supporting Illustrator features introduced during the Creative Suite era and introduction of PDF.

One program that I use, actually rasterizes the PDF file, so that may contribute to that one particular program's rate of success. Again, my competence level does not diminish if I don't have a vector file at all. My process is exactly the same. Yours may not be, but mine is.

People who are making signs, not embroidery stitching patterns, are stuck more along the lines of the process I have to follow. There's no point to us taking a screen shot of a PDF in Adobe Reader and working only from that. That doesn't make people like me incompetent either. The key thing is using the right tools for the job. If I can avoid wasting a bunch of time trying to fix a customer provided PDF or AI file simply by using the right software that actually makes me and my company more competent.

However, remember that this thread was actually talking more about having Adobe ported directly onto the Linux platform, so our little sidebar would actually be moot.

Like you I don't hold out much hope for Adobe to port CC to Linux. Part of the problem is the philosophy of some Linux users who think everything should be open source. Ultimately it's an issue of the sales potential and I think Adobe probably doesn't see much there regardless of how many up votes the idea gets.

Affinity Designer has saved many files from Indesign PDF's for me. It opens PDF files better than AI (unless the PDF was created by AI). I'm sure that you are well aware of Indesign's issues of converting fonts to outlines -- especially script fonts. Affinity can merge those together in so there is no cuts going through things wrong in the vector programs.

When script fonts are converted to outlines parts of one character will overlap the next character. The same thing happens in CorelDRAW, Illustrator, Flexi, etc. None of them automatically weld the characters together when the type is converted to outlines. And that's something I prefer. I like being able to fine tune spacing and do other things to those objects before welding the letters together into one object. Welding is a "destructive" Boolean operation. When cutting vinyl or routing parts anyone should be inspecting the artwork in wireframe/outline view to look out for overlapping objects or objects that aren't cut-ready, such as a rule line that's really just an open path with a line stroke applied to it.

InDesign, unlike Illustrator, is not really meant to output PDFs in a way they can be re-opened in InDesign just like an INDD file. Depending on the settings used for saving the PDF the resulting PDF can be quite a mess if it is imported into a vector drawing program, even Illustrator. The same things can happen to PDFs output from CorelDRAW or any other program that can generate PDFs. A column of text will be separated into a bunch of separate text objects. A single object with a complex fill or stroke will be turned into a bunch of duplicate objects, some of which have no fill or stroke and are just there for masking purposes. They're all hazards for vinyl cutters and routing tables. The Vector First Aid plug-in for Illustrator can quickly solve a lot of those problems and save a whole lot of artwork clean-up time.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

You make the notion of working with vector-based artwork sound completely trivial. This is primarily a sign making forum, not a forum about embroidery. The vast majority of us do not spend our time creating stitching patterns from pixel-based images. Some of the production tools we work with, such as vinyl cutters and routing tables, work only with vector-based artwork. Pixels mean nothing to those machines. When cutting or routing the best results are obtained by using clean, authentic, vector-based artwork. Not some crummy, inaccurate re-creation of it.[/quote]

The main format of stitching files (not the ones that are sent out to the machine) are vector based as well. This comes in handy for when I have to go to the cutter to cut out Applique shapes. So yes, I'm fully aware of programs that need wire frames to run. My Statler Stitcher needs DXF files to then create the file that it needs to stitch out.

Yes, those need to have some level of precision to them.

The, lets call them raw files, but think of them as Ai compared to say DST which is like a png or jpg (in more ways then a lot of people realize) are vector objects. The information that they contain is different compared to what a traditional Ai object would contain. Because of XML capabilities tied to objects, I'm able to include a whole lot of info on these vector objects compared to Ai/Draw file (unless they have changed since CS6 and Draw x5).

But, I still deal in vectors, I'm still recreating in vectors. The only time that I'm not doing that, is when I'm doing realistic animal designs which is then like using Ps for designing. One "pixel" at a time.

The "warts" of re-created artwork might be able to hide in a stitching pattern. The same warts will show up far more easily in cut vinyl, routed lettering or large format printed graphics. You might have a good quick routine for creating stitching of every letter or object in a piece of artwork. But there's nothing quick or easy about having to vectorize a bunch of letters from scratch if the finished result is supposed to look good. It's a whole lot faster and easier to have the same typefaces the client used in the logo. The best thing is just being able to use a vector file of the client's logo and not have to waste any time re-creating any artwork at all.

The process that I use to create the stitch files is actually very similar (if not exact, I don't know his whole process only what videos he has shown) process that Vector Dr uses to create his work.

In some ways, they tools are actually easier to use then doing things via bezier pen tool (which is my preferred tool in any vector software).

And they produce vector objects. They just get exported into stitch files (just like exporting an Ai file to a jpg/png file) or when I'm doing production into text files versus the typical DST file.

You wanna see something interesting, look at the ones that do digitizing services like myself. I would say a good portion of them also do vector creation services. The ones that I know and am in contact with, use digitizing software to create those files. Your higher end digitizing software actually have traditional vector tools to skip even generating stitches in the objects. Output is exclusively a traditional vector object with no stitch information in it at all.

Name a specific application that is a fully functional replacement for Adobe Illustrator, or even CorelDRAW for that matter.

I didn't say 1:1 parity in that post you quoted. I was talking about ones that just view as that's all I needed. I said nothing about 1:1 parity. No program that I'm aware of would have that level of parity. Something will always be different. Doesn't matter if it's workflow or something else. Even the 2 programs that you mention don't have 1:1 parity. Unless one has full 1:1 parity, in my mind, can't qualify for "fully functional replacement".

People who are making signs, not embroidery stitching patterns, are stuck more along the lines of the process I have to follow. There's no point to us taking a screen shot of a PDF in Adobe Reader and working only from that. That doesn't make people like me incompetent either. The key thing is using the right tools for the job. If I can avoid wasting a bunch of time trying to fix a customer provided PDF or AI file simply by using the right software that actually makes me and my company more competent.

I didn't say that it did. I was illustrating the fact that having an Ai file does not mean that what I do is somehow substandard compared to if I was given an Ai file. Or my using just a viewer versus being able to view on Ai software means that I'm not able to get what I need to get.

Like you I don't hold out much hope for Adobe to port CC to Linux. Part of the problem is the philosophy of some Linux users who think everything should be open source. Ultimately it's an issue of the sales potential and I think Adobe probably doesn't see much there regardless of how many up votes the idea gets.

That and you also have some users on other platforms that have have perceptions of the platform that are rooted in the past more then how things are now. Combine those two, it's a big ass hurdle to get over.

 

[brycesteiner]

Name a specific application that is a fully functional replacement for Adobe Illustrator, or even CorelDRAW for that matter.
When script fonts are converted to outlines parts of one character will overlap the next character. .....

I completely understand what needs to be done and how to do it since I do it nearly every day. I was just pointing out that there is software outside of the Adobe box that work extremely well and even better than Adobe's own software in the PDF format at times.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

This is interesting (yes I'm revitalizing an old thread here), while looking through various IDEs, I came across Brackets. From Adobe, it is open source (saw while searching through Github) and it has a Linux version and it's package as a Deb file.

I know on the Linux threads here, package manager files (although really a non issue (and I'll get to why in a sec) even if it was an RPM and I wanted to use it on Ubuntu) are a reason why it's hard for commercial players to distribute software on Linux and if they were going to distribute on Linux, which one would they use. Looks like in Adobe's case, they choose the Deb (or apt-get package manager).

Now, I say that package manager files are a non issue. There are 2 reasons why, but I'm going to only address one right now and that is applicable to the package manager files themselves. These package manager files are actually just like compressed files (zip, tar, rar etc) meaning can go into the archiver program (think along the lines of WinZip, Winrar, PeaZip etc except for Linux (well PeaZip is cross platform, but I haven't tried it with these types of files)), extract, drag and drop and boom, installed on your system. Doesn't matter what the package manager extension it is. They work the same. Some contain more info then others, but it's all extract, drag and drop. Can't get much simpler then that. Now, dependencies might still get you, but those are for sure in the package manager and there are ways to find out which ones you need, depending on the package manager file, there are files that will tell you that you can also extract and look at.

While again, I don't expect the CC suite to be on Linux, nor do I expect Substance Painter (since Adobe bought that suite of programs) to remain on Linux (yes, a closed source program can do well on an open source platform) with the next version, I just thought this was an interesting find. Apparently there is atleast one program that Adobe supports (even if it's not one of their regular commercial programs) on Linux.