keir@vms.macc.wisc.edu (Rick Keir, MACC) (06/06/91)
I have just finished trying to deal with the incredibly intrusive installation procedure that Quark XPress uses. To install this product, you must use a writeable install disk (WRONG-O!); then you must fill out four screens worth of marketing information (they helpfully refer to this as a more convenient registration procedure; gee, when I installed PageMaker they just wanted my name and address). Then you have to insert ANOTHER writeable disk, so they can record the marketing survey in electronic form and have you mail it back to them. THEN their installer decides 2.4 meg is not enough space (their manual says 2 mB is enough). Fine. Quit, purge other applications; restart. Yep: Time to fill out marketing information AGAIN. Get further. Have it choke & die on the 2nd disk; a copied verson of "Program Disk 2" with what appears to be the correct data file on it. No, can't read it. What gives? The disk is ok; perhaps the name is slightly different or something. The contents are identical. At this point, I don't know what else might go wrong. I have better things to do than screw around installing a program written by a company with an attitude problem. I don't install using original disks; I don't insert writeable masters unless forced to at virtual gunpoint. I don't do marketing surveys for free. I *DO* demonstrate software & recommend it to members of the University community; I will be recommending a great many copies of PageMaker to people. I do not need to deal with a second string company with an attitude problem towards its customers. (By the way, I called their tech support number to inquire about my problems, and was told that everyone who could help was "in a meeting." STRIKE THREE, Quark!) rick, still using PageMaker
kucharsk@solbourne.com (William Kucharski) (06/06/91)
In article <1991Jun5.175605.12136@macc.wisc.edu> keir@vms.macc.wisc.edu (Rick Keir, MACC) writes: >Yep: Time to fill out marketing information AGAIN. Get further. >Have it choke & die on the 2nd disk; a copied verson of "Program >Disk 2" with what appears to be the correct data file on it. No, >can't read it. What gives? The disk is ok; perhaps the name >is slightly different or something. The contents are identical. It's probably some type of key disk scheme. At least Quark's a lot better about it now than they were when XPress 2.0 came out; back then you had to insert a key disk to start Quark until they received your registration and then mailed you back an unprotected copy; ick. >At this point, I don't know what else might go wrong. >I have better things to do than screw around installing a program >written by a company with an attitude problem. I don't install >using original disks; I don't insert writeable masters unless >forced to at virtual gunpoint. I don't do marketing surveys >for free. I *DO* demonstrate software & recommend it to members >of the University community; I will be recommending a great >many copies of PageMaker to people. One, and only one disk in the series needs to be writable. Use the damn masters to do the install - who cares? If the disks get trashed, then flame Quark. Personally, I just followed the instructions with the disks and did what they said. Other than running into Gatekeeper (had to go back and shut it off) the entire install went rather smoothly. As far as demonstrating lots of PageMaker: great. Call Aldus Technical Support sometime. See if you get a better response than you do from Quark. Good luck. Call, spend a few hours on hold. See if you even get to someone who can tell you that everyone that could help is in a meeting. Granted, Quark's customer support sucks. So does Aldus'. Too bad Adobe doesn't make a page layout program - now THERE'S a company with some great technical support... -- | William Kucharski, Solbourne Computer, Inc. | Opinions expressed above | Internet: kucharsk@Solbourne.COM | are MINE alone, not those | uucp: ...!{boulder,sun,uunet}!stan!kucharsk | of Solbourne... | Snail Mail: 1900 Pike Road, Longmont, CO 80501 | "It's Night 9 With D2 Dave!"
tag@symbas.UUCP (Arne Gisvold) (06/06/91)
keir@vms.macc.wisc.edu (Rick Keir, MACC) writes: >I have just finished trying to deal with the incredibly intrusive >installation procedure that Quark XPress uses. To install this >product, you must use a writeable install disk (WRONG-O!); then >you must fill out four screens worth of marketing information >(they helpfully refer to this as a more convenient registration >procedure; gee, when I installed PageMaker they just wanted >my name and address). Then you have to insert ANOTHER writeable >disk, so they can record the marketing survey in electronic >form and have you mail it back to them. THEN their installer >decides 2.4 meg is not enough space (their manual says 2 mB >is enough). Fine. Quit, purge other applications; restart. >I do not need to deal with a second string company with an >attitude problem towards its customers. (By the way, I called >their tech support number to inquire about my problems, and was >told that everyone who could help was "in a meeting." STRIKE >THREE, Quark!) If you think this is awkward you should try living out in the sticks (Norway), in this part of the world Xpress is copyprotected in addition to all the other hassles you describe, though they will send you a personalized (from the info on the registration diskette) non-protected copy 2 months after you send in the papers/diskettes. Bu worst of all - in the 2.12 version you could not do installations on FX's because their copyprotection system failed on these machines. Upgrading from 2.12 is because of the copyprotection mechanism fraught with danger, because the upgraded 3.0 uses the serial number from your previous 2.12 program, and if you (as we do) hav customers with multiple copies of Xpress, you loose the upgrade if you use the same copy twice by mistake! Talk about paranoia! Regards Tor-Arne-- ! Tor-Arne Gisvold - Lindmac A/S ! adress : Nordslettveien 1 , N7000 Trondheim, Norway ! UUCP : ...mcsun!nuug!symbas.UUCP!tag or tag@symbas.uucp ! phone: +47-7-966022 FAX : +47-7-964505 APPLELINK : NOR0045 -- ! Tor-Arne Gisvold - Lindmac A/S ! adress : Nordslettveien 1 , N7000 Trondheim, Norway ! UUCP : ...mcsun!nuug!symbas.UUCP!tag or tag@symbas.uucp ! phone: +47-7-966022 FAX : +47-7-964505 APPLELINK : NOR0045
pv0b+@andrew.cmu.edu (Pomona Anupol Valero) (06/08/91)
i agree with eric douglas, "you can't blame a company for trying to protect its software." and don't knock a software package because of some minor marketing scheme and their method of copy-protection. in the long run, you'll be saving more time and headaches if you utilize quark's features over pagemaker's. i use both packages quite extensively, the carnegie mellon supports pagemaker as a mac layout program and at one of my off-campus jobs, we primarily use quark. and there have been many times i've wished that the university owned at least *one* copy of quark...i have been forced to compromise all too often because of pagemaker. give quark another chance and see what happens. //pomona valero Carnegie Mellon University Pittsburgh, Pensylvannia
Adam.Frix@p18.f20.n226.z1.FIDONET.ORG (Adam Frix) (06/10/91)
pv0b+@andrew.cmu.edu (Pomona Anupol Valero) writes:
PAV> i agree with eric douglas, "you can't blame a company for trying
PAV> to protect its software."
PAV> and don't knock a software package because of some minor marketing
PAV> scheme and their method of copy-protection. in the long run,
PAV> you'll be saving more time and headaches if you utilize quark's
PAV> features over pagemaker's.
I can indeed blame a company for assuming that its customers, who shelled out $500 or so for the program, are willing to blatantly ignore the license agreement and give copies away to anyone they please. For Quark to assume by default that its customers are crooks and therefore the program needs some sort of protection--ANY sort of protection--against such thieves is, IMHO, a crass act, not a class act.
And to you and others who insist that "Yeah, sure, it's copy protected and that causes problems, but look at all those great features!", I say those features are entirely useless if the copy protection scheme forces a situation where the user doesn't have access to them.
And any sort of copy-protection scheme which _requires_ the user to insert an unlocked master is inherently faulty, unless the company absolutely and without question understands the risks of such an action and is **willing** (this is the most important part) to take care of damaged/partially erased/whatever masters IMMEDIATELY and WITH MINIMUM HASSLES. But by its nature, handling the problem of a damaged master disk means several days wait by the customer, who at that point probably isn't going to be ver
y pleased. So I see no good (for the user) coming out of any scheme which requires an unlocked master disk be put into a floppy drive.
Quark might do itself a little better by loosening up a bit. Assuming that your customers are crooks is not good.
--Adam--
--
Adam Frix via cmhGate - Net 226 fido<=>uucp gateway Col, OH
UUCP: ...!osu-cis!n8emr!cmhgate!20.18!Adam.Frix
INET: Adam.Frix@p18.f20.n226.z1.FIDONET.ORGtgoose@eng.umd.edu (Jason Garms) (06/12/91)
In article <1991Jun5.175605.12136@macc.wisc.edu>, keir@vms.macc.wisc.edu (Rick Keir, MACC) writes: [article which says is critical of Quark express deleted] > > rick, > still using PageMaker I whole-heartedly agree. When I worked for ComputerLand we received a free demo copy so that we could use the program and get familiar with it. (Supposedly so we could use it better.) Well here's the story: I designed a small newspaper (10 pages) in it which included many Adobe fonts, imported Freehand EPS files (which also had encapulated fonts) and other goodies. When I printed it, all of the fonts from the placed Freehand files were substituted with courier. I tried everything possible including trying different versions of Finder, Printer Drivers, different adobe fonts, turning off suitcase, etc. Nothing worked. I called Quark and gave them my serial number and told them I was with ComputerLand. They put me on hold for about 8 minutes while they verified the serial number or something. THis is a long distance call which I was making from my house! Pretty exensive. Then another person got on the phone and ran down a whole list of things to check. This took another few minutes and finally he assured me that my problem was using LaserWriter 6.0. He claimed that I needed 6.0.1. He was sure this was the problem. Well I said thanks and hung up. FOr the sake of argument I tried it. Still no luck. I called them back and this time got a different tech person. I told them that I didn't want to speak to the one that I spoke to before. This tech person had me explain my situation and immediatly asked me to check the release I had. He explained that I needed the update which fix problems printing fonts in EPS files. Why didn't the previous person know this? It seemed pretty important to me. Later I called Quark about purchasing their package for use here at school. They said they could offer a $200 discount for educational institutions. I could go to my local Quark dealer and get this discount. This ment that I could go to Egghead and buy Quark express at the educational discount of $595 or I could pay their normal price of $570. When I asked the Quark rep about this, she wouldn't comment. So I did the only reasonable thing. Went and bought the educational version of PageMaker for $199, even though I like Quark Express better. What a shame. Jason Garms tgoose@eng.umd.edu
jxb@ely.cl.cam.ac.uk (Jeremy Ball) (06/12/91)
My apologies if I duplicate any other comments on this topic -Ive just come in on the thread. I too find the Quark installation obnoxious but for different reasons. Fistly, it might not be so bad if they didnt then send you a copy free version on registration without the need to insert master discs. What is the point in giving out a costly version protected when you ultimately get an unprotected version anyway - answer: to make sure that you register. I hate that. Especially when the registration is performed on disc and I dont know what other information may be taken from the system (but thats another issue). Secondly, in reply to a point about `in 10 minutes you can be running...' (sorry, I lost the ref). YOU MAY NOT BE ABLE TO. I bought a IIsi in england with the English version of QExp3.0 . English pricing is more or less dollar-for-pound (again, another issue). It cost me about 850 pounds including our sales tax, say $1100. The protection used crashes the IIsi every time whenever the system is started - you dont get past the insert disc dialog. I had to wait for my copy free version to get into the system. For $1100-ish, I find that disgusting. Basically, those with the IIsi and possibly other new models are forced to register to be able to use the program at all. Again, hardly good customer relations. I know thay have to proetect their product, but this is not from my point of view a good way to do it. I compare the process with my Word 4 installation, and vastly prefer the latter. I have to say that I do like the program very much, but would have to think seriously about buying any other program that might come from the same stable if an alternative exists. My wife and I run a small scale DTP outfit, and we can afford the turnaround time to get copy free versions of software. The word 4.0 stable can supply me with goods anytime I can pay for them :-) On another issue, QExp3.0 seems buggy on our machine. The IIsi crashes regularly when using it. Is it just our copy or inherent? Our dealer aint too knowledgeable (they didnt tell us about the protection problem after all). Try importing Word text into a column where the column is smaller than the margin set up in the text. Machine goes bloeey. It sounds like a silly thing to do, but we had a document from another source and didnt know about the margins they had used. I would expect an error box, not a hung system. We learnt to back up regularly the hard way as some crashes just happen repeatedly without warning. My tuppence worth. Jeremy.
breidenb@Informatik.TU-Muenchen.DE (Oliver Breidenbach) (06/12/91)
In article <287787.28545A15@cmhgate.FIDONET.ORG> Adam.Frix@p18.f20.n226.z1.FIDONET.ORG (Adam Frix) writes: > >I can indeed blame a company for assuming that its customers, who shelled out $500 or so for the program, are willing to blatantly ignore the license agreement and give copies away to anyone they please. For Quark to assume by default that its customers >are crooks and therefore the program needs some sort of protection--ANY sort of protection--against such thieves is, IMHO, a crass act, not a class act. I think you never installed Quark XPress. It is very easy and doesn't last more than 10 minutes. After the installation is completed you can copy QXP and give it away. The only copy protection is that your name and adress (if you gave it during the installation procedure) is now stored in the program and that you can start the program only one at a time on your lan. This is not a classic "copy-protection" it is merely a "enforce license agreement" mechanism and it doesn't do you any harm. BTW, you are shurely the only person in this universe who had never touched a piece of pirated software. But for the rest it must be made as hard as possible to pirate the software without annoying the bunch of legal users. >And to you and others who insist that "Yeah, sure, it's copy protected and that causes problems, but look at all those great features!", I say those features are entirely useless if the copy protection scheme forces a situation where the user doesn't have > access to them. You can hardly call that "copy protection" as I said before. >Quark might do itself a little better by loosening up a bit. Assuming that your customers are crooks is not good. I personally am a customer and I don't bother if they assume that I am a crook as long as I can use their software which I have payed a lot of money for. BTW, I have received at least four free updates from them since I bought it. They even came without me having to ask for. That's what I call "service". I can pirate MS Word because it isn't protected at all, but I never got even an anouncement from them about the 4.00D release and learned only by chance about it, even though I have payed for it as well... What I like to say is that Quark does not seem to terrorize their customers... Oliver. (just adding a few things, don't take them personal, Adam.)