quark.com — Quark XPress remains the industry leader page-layout ap (despite attempts by Adobe to shove InDesign down everyone's throat). A free public beta is available - and will remain functional until March 31st. Go get your design on! (Both for Mac OS X and Windows)
Jan 12, 2006 View in Crawl 4
elpipetuanisJan 12, 2006
xpress is so antiquated and old. It is nothing compared to InDesign. They grew complacent in the 90's and never improved. Now they are trying to play catch up. In my opinion quark is a gonner.
m1928Jan 13, 2006
Quark has a place in the industry. InDesign has grown in market share as it has improved -- but also from Adobes strength with Photoshop and Illustrator. Many companies are switching because of cost considerations -- they are buying the upgrades to Photoshop and Illustrator -- so they basically get InDesign free. Both are solid performers. The way the programs work sometimes ends up being your personal preference -- in boxes for text etc. I have issues with both programs. I use the one that makes the most sense for the job/client.I am willing to look at the beta -- hey it is free -- certainly an improvement from the old Quark corporation. It is nice that Quark has some competition -- we win regardless of which program we use.
ryebryeJan 16, 2006Submitter
Whenever I hear a designer say "I don't use Quark" I immediately think to myself "You are not a pro." - Certainly you have instances where InDesign is a better program to use - but in general if you don't have Quark you are not a professional designer. You are working in house.The problem with InDesign is the major headaches involved with output. From a company that wrote PostScript - you would expect a lot more. The output process with InDesign usually involves making a gigantic print-ready PDF. With Quark - it's usually just as simple as collecting for output and sending the file to the service bureau. (Yes, I know that implies that thye have Quark - but they also usually have InDesign and will not accept files in that format.)I'm sorry if I pissed off some of the in-house hacks. Quark really IS still the standard for professional (read: not in-house hacks) designers. All this is in spite of the fact that everyone hates the company.
jubei96Dec 10, 2006
Sure, I'm replying to something that's 11 months old, but someone like ryebrye really need to be study harder about the difference between Quark and InDesign. Buddy get used to PDFs, it's here to stay. BTW, PDF doesn't have to be "gigantic" if you know what you are doing. I get the feeling Rye is suggesting by "collecting to output" his files are actually smaller than hi-res PDF... Take a closer look at Quark, they are supporting PDF precisely because they know Adobe already gained ground on them. Quark is smart enough to make changes but is a bit too late to gain new customers/designers. Quark has most of the old school designers and IT Dept. that has already invested a ton of money in it and are too lazy to change and learn something new. It has nothing to do with Quark being better than InDesign anymore.