Mac OS 9 Lives

Classic Mac OS Software => Business Software & Application Suites => Topic started by: Mat on July 12, 2015, 10:05:19 AM

Title: Canvas 8 - your experiances?
Post by: Mat on July 12, 2015, 10:05:19 AM
Yesterday I discovered Deneba Canvas 8 for the first time. The last years I thought it is some 3d program, ... but as you might know it is more an Office/Presentation/Layout/Imaging program.

From the first look it seems to be a quite professional program. I was very excited about the PDF-Import for example, as we have so few good PDF-Readers for Mac OS 9. but after some tries even the simplest PDF 1.3 have problems.

So what is your experiance? Is it a very professional program? Is it worth to try learning how to use it? Or should I stay with RagTime and AppleWorks?
What do you use it for?
Title: Re: Canvas 8 - your experiances?
Post by: MacTron on July 12, 2015, 10:22:47 AM
Deneba Canvas 3.5.6 is my Illustration App from the last two decades. From this version onwards, they only made an awfully bad Windows port.
If you really need a "top PRO app" Go for Adobe Illustrator 9 and forget about this one (and the Macromedia shit).
Title: Re: Canvas 8 - your experiances?
Post by: Mat on July 12, 2015, 10:52:22 AM
Deneba Canvas 3.5.6 is my Illustration App from the last two decades. From this version onwards, they only made an awfully bad Windows port.
Interresting. So you use it for your vector graphic stuff, ... I was searching for other "Office" applications.

If you really need a "top PRO app" Go for Adobe Illustrator 9 and forget about this one (and the Macromedia shit).
No I don´t need a "top PRO app" for graphic stuff. I want to get rid of MS Office for Mac 2001 as it is quite useless these days with XML stuff and changed RTF. So I searched other Office suites, and I like StarOffice a lot, it is damn fast and quite professional, but it is from 1996. So I thought "have a look what else is in existance".

And interresting about Illustrator 9. Is there a reason that you do not recommend Version 10?
And about "Macromedia Shit", ... ;) I am one of those who still love Freehand, as well as I still do my stuff with rock solid Quark XPress 4. I just do not like the Adobe products. :-)
Title: Re: Canvas 8 - your experiances?
Post by: MacTron on July 12, 2015, 11:41:02 AM
Deneba Canvas 3.5.6 is my Illustration App from the last two decades. From this version onwards, they only made an awfully bad Windows port.
Interresting. So you use it for your vector graphic stuff, ... I was searching for other "Office" applications.

Canvas 3.5.6 can handle vector graphics, bitmaps, Quickdraw and Postcript at the same time, And It have a very good typographic capabilities. It's always my first choice. If I need more PRO capabilities, then I go for Photoshop 5.5, Illustrator 9, Pagemaker 7 or even VectorWorks 9.5.


If you really need a "top PRO app" Go for Adobe Illustrator 9 and forget about this one (and the Macromedia shit).

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And interresting about Illustrator 9. Is there a reason that you do not recommend Version 10?

Because Illustrator 10 its a carbon app if my memory serves ...

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And about "Macromedia Shit", ... ;) I am one of those who still love Freehand,
I was a happy Freehand user too, until Macromedia bought it and became a slow, buggy and "Windows like" program.

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as well as I still do my stuff with rock solid Quark XPress 4. I just do not like the Adobe products. :-)

I have made a lot of stuff with Quark XPress, I think it is the best.

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I just do not like the Adobe products. :-)

Why?
, just curious ...
Title: Re: Canvas 8 - your experiances?
Post by: Mat on July 12, 2015, 02:33:55 PM
Well, good that we agree about XPress 4 ;) Yes, Illustrator 10 is a Carbon application, but what´s wrong with CarbonLib?

About Freehand, ... well the Aldus days :-)

About Adobe, I do not like the thousands of palettes. And I always got the feeling they overact with integration. It is slow, blown up, and senseless often. I always feel like they do not improve what users demand, but what looks fancy and what they belive will push sellings. So no wise and good programmed product (like XPress 4). To me it seems obsolecenc was always (beginning with Photoshop 5) built into their products. But wait - there are no products anymore, you can just "borrow" the functionality if you pay monthly, … ;)
Title: Re: Canvas 8 - your experiances?
Post by: MacTron on July 13, 2015, 08:10:33 AM
Well, good that we agree about XPress 4 ;) Yes, Illustrator 10 is a Carbon application, but what´s wrong with CarbonLib?

The use of CarbonLib dramatically slow down the apps that use it, specially drawing and text apps. So carbon apps should be avoided, unless you don't have any alternative.
Furthermore, as it adds a extra layer of complexity, it is prone to bugs.

The good point is that most routines in CarbonLib are multithreaded and dual CPU aware, but the prejudices are bigger than the benefits.  :'(
Title: Re: Canvas 8 - your experiances?
Post by: IIO on July 13, 2015, 02:08:00 PM
About Adobe, I do not like the thousands of palettes.

luckily flash or dreamweaver only have like 300 of those :P
Title: Re: Canvas 8 - your experiances?
Post by: GaryN on December 18, 2015, 02:43:57 PM
Deneba Canvas 3.5.6 is my Illustration App from the last two decades. From this version onwards, they only made an awfully bad Windows port.
If you really need a "top PRO app" Go for Adobe Illustrator 9 and forget about this one (and the Macromedia shit).

I just fell across this posting and I have to ask:

Mactron, did you encounter a "drop dead" date in the old Deneba Canvas? One of the most aggravating experiences I've had with software was when my fully-legitimate-bought-and-paid-for Copy of Canvas 3.5 (which came on a whole boxful of 3.5" floppies) suddenly refused to boot one day and displayed a small box that said simply "Time Expired". Turns out they had actually written an expiration date into the startup routine to kill the software some 8 or 10 years (I can't be sure exactly how long) down the road after release. Talk about a "forced" upgrade path!

Of course, by the time this happened, Deneba was no more and ACD Systems couldn't care less that I just wanted to keep using 3.5 on OS9. So, for a few years, until I acquired Canvas 8, I used a Quickeys macro to: turn the date back on my Mac to before the expiration date, launch the app and then return the date. I actually still use that sometimes because Canvas 3 is far better suited to less complex drawings than Canvas 8.

Anybody else ever encounter this ridiculous situation?
Title: Re: Canvas 8 - your experiances?
Post by: MacTron on December 18, 2015, 05:22:36 PM
Deneba Canvas 3.5.6 is my Illustration App from the last two decades. From this version onwards, they only made an awfully bad Windows port.
If you really need a "top PRO app" Go for Adobe Illustrator 9 and forget about this one (and the Macromedia shit).

I just fell across this posting and I have to ask:

Mactron, did you encounter a "drop dead" date in the old Deneba Canvas?

Of course I do.

It was solved with a later upgrade, 3.5.5 I think.