QuarkXPress 6 = Dogshit
March 18th, 2004Calling all creatives: Do not buy, install and/or use QuarkXPress 6. Can we please migrate all creative to Adobe InDesign? Yes, Adobe isn’t exactly the most friendly software supplier, but we’re talking the lesser of two evils here, people.
It has been a long time since I had cracked open a Quark product, having made the transition to InDesign a couple of years ago. It’s as if Quark looked at their interface and said, “Let’s spend 20 minutes… ok, 5 minutes making XPress OS X compliant. By the way, let’s also disable key features until they call our support line or register online. Let’s also make sure that our North American clients call an offshore call center in say, Bangalore where English is a third or fourth language.”
Nothing has changed since 1999. It’s dreadful. All the bad memories came flooding back. The crashes. The arrogance of Quark as a company. The pain of using their flagship product. But hey, I can export my print design TO THE WEB! Nothing says that a company is clued in like integrating print and web design IN THE MOST RIDICULOUS WAY POSSIBLE.
Then there is the PDF exporting. 154 Megabyte PDF. Sweet, bro. Sweet. Same file from InDesign, 4 Megabytes. Baby, why you got to play me like that?
Plus, I love having the following discussions:
With agency:
Me: “Can you please provide the files in InDesign?”
Agency: “Quark is the industry standard.”
Me: “Yes. The industry standard PIECE OF SHIT.”
Agency: “Quark 6 files will be coming your way soon!”
With press professionals:
Me: “I’ve done these in InDesign.”
Press: “Oh lordy.”
[time passes]
Press: “Dude! You were totally right about InDesign! It is great!” o
March 18th, 2004 at 3:37 pm
Fuck Quark.
Quark needs to die. The idiots who run that company:
a) don’t understand their core market
b) treat their core martket like they could take them or leave them.
Indesign’s ablility to import photoshop layers with their full alphas is worth the price of admission alone!
But hey, if a PRINT DESIGNER needs to export an XML document, Quark has you covered. bwahahahaha
lol! What a bunch of clown boats. They’ve already lost A BUNCH of business to Adobe and rightfully so. Adobe is actually listening to customers, innovating, and adding NEW FEATURES. Plus, like John basically pointed out, PDF is the standared for print-based workflow these days, so Indesign is a no brainer…
Remember in the not so distant past(Quark 4) when you had to rely on that PDF export extra that would use acrbat distiller and a PPD to export an accurate PDF ? Remember how the PPD and distiller files would corrupt and you’d have to jump through hoops and pray to lord jeebus to make it work again?
Or was that just me?
Quark is a flaming hunk of shit that will go the way of pagemaker……
March 18th, 2004 at 6:18 pm
The world wouldbe an extremely happy place, if quark were to die off completely. My life would then be complete, and I would never have to make another quark file printing press friendly for some pseudo designer that doesn’t understand how to form 1 friggin copy block and instead uses 33.
Long live Adobe.
March 19th, 2004 at 8:03 am
Yeah, I dunno. I use both now. I started on PageMaker, so I think that program absorbed most of my print-program hatred. While Quark has its problems, I can’t say I despised 6.0. I did hate their serial number conspiracy. Even if you had a legal serial number, you had to call dead people who once lived in Bolivia to make it actually run. And that floating serial number you can buy in order to put it on a lap top as well as you desk-top? That’s a damn joke. Don’t even get me started about having to call in for an “Activation Code” I spent hours trying to figure that shit out. Not something one wants to do under a tight deadline. So basically, after having to talk to one too many QuarkXpress customer “Service” representatives, I finally just gave up and moved to InDesign entirely.
So, I guess my beef isn’t so much behind the actual software, as it seemed to work pretty fine for me, my beef is more with the police state they have produced when one tries to actually use it.
I have given up using it entirely except on the days I have to teach it to students.
March 19th, 2004 at 9:52 am
I do love Quark 4, our company hasn’t upgraded to OS X and we’re fine here with 9.1 and Q4. I am a bit wary of making the leap to InDesign, because Pagewrecker was so traumatic. I guess it’s inevitable, though.
March 19th, 2004 at 10:21 am
For some reason I have had this Quark versus InDesign discussion more times this past week than I have collectively in the past 2 years. I wait patiently for the day Quark goes away forever. It is an outdated, fragile, piece of shit.
March 19th, 2004 at 10:55 am
I am so with you on this one. My company switched over to InDesign, and I dragged my feet. But now that I understand it and more importantly, am comfortable in Indesign, jumping back to Quark is just awful. Like you, I have run into problems with designers refusing to make the switch, so I have Quark 6 installed. And what a f-ing nightmare. It automatically defaults to saving the file in 6, which no one else has, so you have to go in and resave in 5. Also, the short cut kets have changed just enough to make it just that just more annoying. Honestly, who would stay with this application when it doesn’t ever adapt to its customers’ needs?
March 19th, 2004 at 11:49 am
I only see one advantage in QX: After you are able to use a program like that you can run any program with your feet’s fingers.
March 19th, 2004 at 3:41 pm
I had to format the hard drive on my TiBook. I reinstalled all of my Adobe products without problem.
Quark 6 would not install. It said I had too many copies installed already. This was perplexing, since it was only installed on my recently formatted TiBook.
I was on a very tight deadline, and it took 2-1/2 days of calling every Quark representative on the globe. I too left many messages and emails with “Tech Support” in Bangladesh and Pakistan. Apparently they were not on my time schedule in Los Angeles, because nobody ever responded.
The second day, I called every phone number and pager listed on the Quark website. Finally, the “Southern U.S.” regional manager called me back and gave me the number of my “West Coast” regional manager. About 24 hours after that, I had my Quark 6 up and running.
It turns out that I was prohibited from installing it on my TiBook - because I had previously installed it on that very same TiBook!?! (same physical hardware address).
Coincidently, Quark removed all of the phone numbers from their website the following day.
March 20th, 2004 at 1:46 pm
Did you notice in the time you used 6.0 that some of the features they had in 5.0 were “disabled?” You were forced to first find out that you had to download them as extensions off their Web site. I just don’t get this. If you put up the 1000 bucks to buy the friggin software, make it at least be in its entirety. No?
March 20th, 2004 at 4:59 pm
yeah, try going straight to plate with quark. i thought printers had figured out every way possible to screw up pre-press, but this raises it to the level of performance art.
add to that the fact that quark-to-pdf files consistently misrepresent the final product - which is always fun when you are on a tight turnaround based with a client whose print experience consists entirely of a carved potato and an ink pad.
jon, find me a good graphic artist with print experience in los angeles, PLEASE.
March 21st, 2004 at 7:30 pm
Why do you need an LA graphic designer? I’m all you need, right here.
March 22nd, 2004 at 9:02 am
i have yet to actually install InDesign, as it sits here in its box getting dusty. call me old school, all me very very nervous, but the frustration level at QXP is pushing to to the point that I actually OPENED THE BOX this weekend. It’s like dating someone for a really really long time - they’re shitheads and worthless and bring you down and they’re unemployed and eat all your snacks and tell you you’ve put on weight, but I still feel like QXP really LOVES me. Don’t worry, I’ll come to my senses soon. Date Quark, marry InDesign.
March 22nd, 2004 at 11:24 am
i am only familiar with the quark 4.0, i am sad to hear that the new one blows…thanks for the headsup
-Court
March 22nd, 2004 at 12:46 pm
The Quark crashes are killing my soul. I’m so frustrated. InDesign, here I come! Fuck industry standard! Hows it ever going to change if we all keep saying that???
March 22nd, 2004 at 1:51 pm
I use Quark at my job for our quarterly brochures, and it’s always a nightmare when we have to get the files ready for our print service. But at this point they don’t want to spend the $$ to get InDesign and send me to more training, especially since they know I’ll probably only be on the job for one more year before quitting to be an at-home mom.
March 22nd, 2004 at 2:02 pm
So we were forced into Quark 6 because our vendors insist we use it… one major problem… the other half of our vendors still use Quark 4, but in Quark 6 you can’t save in Quark 4 format. Wow what a treat.
And like has been said, what improvements have been made to Quark in, oh say, the past 10 years? I mean, aside from that XML feature, which we all so desperately needed.
I also had the activation problem, 3 days down is so good for business. Finally, combining this with all the bugs of Panther, I crash everytime I try to change up printer settings, import a picture or use a different font.
But you know, why would I want to do any of those things anyway.
March 22nd, 2004 at 9:46 pm
English is a second language in Bangalore, not a third or fouth language.
March 23rd, 2004 at 12:04 am
I am still waondering how often people post the other thing named “Quark”. Remeber the garbage collecting space scow?
Surely it can be that bib of a co-incidence
March 23rd, 2004 at 12:26 pm
jon,
all my printers use quark for straight to plate.
heh.
want some work? how about a portfolio of your slashing political attacks?
March 23rd, 2004 at 5:51 pm
Kill Quark Now! Kill Quark Now!
I switched when InDesign 1.5 hit the street and have loved life ever since. Most of the printers I work with are making the switch after I pointed out your same points… I chuckle at people that continue to support Quark… their time lost - not mine!
March 24th, 2004 at 1:39 am
all with you guys on that one. never liked quark — plus, how good can a program be that is named after the sound frogs make, hm? looove InDesign! and — you can open and work with quark-documents in InDesign and quark can’t do things like that — it’s just quark .. btw — here in germany InDesign is perfectly accepted and there are no problems at all with printers or other repro-places …
March 24th, 2004 at 1:54 pm
I think Quark has killed itself with it’s hubris. Been using the program since 1.0. Taught many a designer, editor and publisher to do the same. I’ve watched the rise of Quark, and I’ll enjoy watching the fall. Quark has always acted like a bunch of cheapskates and treated their customers like dirt. They had an amazing product and cornered the market with it but many designers, it seems, (I thought it was just me that couldn’t be bothered) stopped upgrading after 4. Their latest authentication scheme makes it impossible to work with the program without recofiguring your firewall just for them. Schools hate it and won’t install it. The next generaltion of designers are learning InDesign.
Thanks for the venting opportunity!
March 24th, 2004 at 3:56 pm
I am OSX battle weary..
Imagine my quandary. I’m on an endlessly rotating series of print deadlines. I’m force switching the studio to X, cause the hardware is aging and Apple is saying bye bye to 9.
So we’ve been slowly dipping into QXP6 from 4.1 (did ANYONE buy 5?). As the geek of the office I’ve been tasked with figuring it out.
Gave in and got Suitcase, though it’s terribly slow and oddly interfaced (why can’t I type the first letter of the font I want to scroll to?). It works sort of okay, but it’s clear as mud as to how it interacts with Apple’s FontBook.
Bought a couple of upgrade licenses of QXP6. Built in pdf feature works well, but you can’t use the default job settings, unless you love the uncompressed files for ripping to pixels.
BTW: Anyone know what my pre-flight options are now in X? Extensis has forgotten they made PreFlight (it’s gone off their main page).
Am yet to find a bureau or press operator who’s gone to QXP6. Annoying to have to resave everything down to 5. Looking to steal a “conversion demo” of QXP5 to get my files back to 4 so the rest of the studio can use them.
I’m not sure if this is limited to Quark BTW. Adobe sucks pond scum too in my book. Illustrator X is a buggy piece of shite, and no thanks, I’m not buying “CS”, just got over the upgrade from 8.0 to 9.0 to 10.00 (what was that, about a year?). I still keep copies of 6 and 8 to work on complex files.
The feature split in Acrobat is a deliberate money grab and bow to Windows, with that idiot proof interface change and moving of many of the previously included aspects off to a Pro level package.
I went up to GoLive CS (I know Dreamweavers, but I’ve owned this product before Adobe bought it) to get X compatibility and they’ve finally fixed a number of maddening interface issues.
Photoshop is still a pig on X.
Epson RIP doesn’t work simply anymore - in fact printing postscript in X is an absurdly complicated affair.
I fell like my time investment in the interface is lost. Each new iteration tweaks or breaks a previous convention just an annoying little bit. And I’ve got to get three other designers up to speed on it soon…
What did I upgrade for? I just don’t know sometime. My server runs great on X though…maybe I’ll become a Linux geek and check print work.
(thanks for letting me vent)
March 30th, 2004 at 7:09 pm
quark is like a backed-up toilet on a sweltering summer day. hate is the word. hate. InDesign may have it’s own neurotic tics, but give me a deadline and I’ll pick InDesign every time.
April 5th, 2004 at 7:17 pm
Agreed ! I hate when it quits on me !!
Here check this I hate Quark stuff @ http://www.cafepress.com/quarkxpress
I already wear one of there tshirts and love my InDesign
April 13th, 2004 at 2:26 pm
Why is Quark even around anymore? The sad fact is, layout people can’t seem to make a change, even if it’s for the better. They fall into old ways and have been hypnotized by Quark’s stupid interface. And the stupider Quark gets, the stupider the reasons for staying with it get. People who continue to use Quark have serious battered wife syndrome and need help.
Help in the form of InDesign. Salvation in the form of being able to work without the stupid piece of code crashing an hour’s worth of work. Salvation in the form of being able to edit a table within the flow of the document. Or master pages that, y’know, work like a master page.
I “inherited” Quark 6 and Quark files from my manager and his “consultant,” after successfully moving to InDesign in my private life and I just wonder what God is laughing harder at: my pain or our collective stupidity.
I’d like to uninstall this useless monstrosity and toss it in the East River. Being in California, I can almost guarantee the bastard won’t come back.
Can we start a support group for people who need help? Can Adobe come up with some competitve upgrade discount for the suckered?
Hate Quark? No. If I hated it, I would want to see it die a slow death. I actually want to see it just end quickly and painlessly. Call me a wuss.
April 13th, 2004 at 7:45 pm
Oh…My…God Becky!!!
When I began with Quark several years ago it was cool…but, now it sucks sweaty elephant b@!!$. It has become my biggest headache. I don’t even know how many times I have to try and create a freaggin’ pdf. IT SHOULD BE AS EASY AS PICKING YOUR NOSE PEOPLE!!!
I can give you an idea:
1. open print diologue and do the usual b.s.
2. save to file
3. wait for distiller
4. open file to realize it didn’t work
5. do over again or
6. create a f$#@% eps page (that makes sense)
7. open in illustrator (blood pressure climing)
8. save as a pdf
9. it still didn’t work right
10. pull your hair, spit, curse really, really bad
11. scream at your monitor
12. take a 9 iron to your computer
13, have a corinary because they want the file yesterday and you can’t create a simple freaggin’ p…d…f.
14. strike a deal with the devil to get InDesign.
Oh, and don’t even get me started with the student discount (audience…”what student discount?”).
Exactly.
Thanks, InDesign.
April 17th, 2004 at 2:10 pm
I continue to think Quark is a wonderful program. But please… don’t let that interrupt your torrent of hatred and bile.
April 17th, 2004 at 9:33 pm
I seem to hear a lot of people say they have activation problems with Quark 6; did earlier versions of Quark have this problem? Anyone know if 4.1 for Windows will run on Windows XP?
April 19th, 2004 at 10:09 am
If Quark XPress won’t work on a beautiful, easy to use macintosh, then your Windows version is F@@ked.
Better get a new Job.
April 19th, 2004 at 10:09 am
If Quark XPress won’t work on a beautiful, easy to use macintosh, then your Windows version is F@@ked.
Better get a new Job.
April 23rd, 2004 at 9:09 am
Methinks that somehow the actual rudderless meandering of the once wave-making company, Quark, must be related to the retirement of the former captain of the ship, software visionary Tim Gill. That man deserves a lot of credit. But he called it quits between the releases of versions 4 and 5, if you catch my drift: isn’t that when things began to go bad? The XML stuff was a good idea, just poorly implemented, as he had left before it was fully written. So, now that he’s definitively moved on to other things, would someone please go over there and start driving that QuarkXPress thing in a good direction again, PLEASE?
April 29th, 2004 at 6:54 pm
die quark you fuckinn cock arrrrrrrrrr!!!!!!!!!!! after spending a whole night on a v tight deadline the fuckhead q6 decides to crash and delet the whole wanking file!!!! not to bring up the whole norton and suitcase conflict!!!3000 fonts and i cant manage one of them you fucking basterd quark!!! die die die!!!!!! ive allready dented the g5 in a rage next time its gonna be a quark md!!!! you fucker!!!!! ordering indesign is this gonna be any better??? why the hell cant these companys just make a friggin product…. barn on!!! and how dare you not fucking work after the whole mac world had had to wait for you money munching cunts to realese the product and then declare your greatness will ‘free upgrades ‘ that dont even fucking work when you should be paying me to fucking use it bastards bastards bastards bastards bastards bastards bastards bastards !!!!!!!!!!
April 29th, 2004 at 7:00 pm
a whole nights work erased!!!!
April 29th, 2004 at 7:02 pm
die quark you fuckinn cock arrrrrrrrrr!!!!!!!!!!! after spending a whole night on a v tight deadline the fuckhead q6 decides to crash and delet the whole wanking file!!!! not to bring up the whole norton and suitcase conflict!!!3000 fonts and i cant manage one of them you fucking basterd quark!!! die die die!!!!!! ive allready dented the g5 in a rage next time its gonna be a quark md!!!! you fucker!!!!! ordering indesign is this gonna be any better??? why the hell cant these companys just make a friggin product…. barn on!!! and how dare you not fucking work after the whole mac world had had to wait for you money munching cunts to realese the product and then declare your greatness will ‘free upgrades ‘ that dont even fucking work when you should be paying me to fucking use it bastards bastards bastards bastards bastards bastards bastards bastards !!!!!!!!!!
April 29th, 2004 at 7:03 pm
after spending a whole night on a v tight deadline the fuckhead q6 decides to crash and delet the whole wanking file!!!! not to bring up the whole norton and suitcase conflict!!!3000 fonts and i cant manage one of them you fucking basterd quark!!! die die die!!!!!! and how dare you not fucking work after the whole mac world had had to wait for you money munching cunts to realese the product and then declare your greatness will ‘free upgrades ‘ that dont even fucking work when you should be paying me to fucking use it bastards bastards bastards bastards bastards bastards bastards bastards !!!!!!!!!!
April 29th, 2004 at 7:06 pm
hi im calmed now thanks for the outlet let me know how you are. we can talk about tranquil streams and rivers distant birds bathing next to water falls beautifull!
May 17th, 2004 at 11:07 pm
Started on pagemaker, taught Q for years, and switched to InDesign as soon as I could. NEVER going back.
The killer for me was when I called Q to buy it for the lab at my public high school. They wanted SEVEN THOUSAND DOLLARS for a license. I calmly explained that this was more than my entire budget for two years. The helpful, cold and unsympathetic person on the phone explained that I could buy a lab pack for only $3,000, but I wouldn’t be able to buy upgrades. I finally said OK and she sent me SIX PAGES of paperwork to fill out, including my course outlines, to prove I merited this huge educational discount. Oh, and there was one more thing…I was supposed to install plastic ‘dongles’ on each and every machine in order for Q to work…
I called Adobe and they beat the price. I spent about 20 minutes looking through the program and I was up and running in InDesign. I especially love teaching it to adults who are used to Quark and Pagemaker. As I go through its well-thought-out features, it’s like giving them a series of presents, and the ooohs and aaahs are music to my ears. It has a few bugs, but Adobe upgrades, REALLY upgrades, often, and they listen and fix things. I called tech support a few months and got a great guy who spent almost half an hour with me, free.
And by the way, if you haven’t upgraded to the CS version of InDesign, it has some really worthwhile features. It’s a much better beast than version 2.
Quark is now paying for their arrogance and stupidity (a tabs window that covers your entire document and isn’t re-sizeable, and then three years later, they upgrade and don’t fix it…even stooopid ol’ microsoft word uses a palette for tabs instead of a window. What a no-brainer!)
The only feature I miss is jabberwocky, a short-lived way to create your own placeholder text in several flavors.
Glad so many others share my total fed-upness with Q
August 14th, 2004 at 5:23 pm
As a tech in a the Worlds largest commercial printing firm let me say this….Quark 4 is solid, dependable, and works well…..soooooo now we have Quark 6 and yes indeed it truly blows….2004: the year Quark died!
August 24th, 2004 at 10:54 am
I work at a printshop that refuses to spend any money. Therefor, i’m still running OS8 on some of these computers. I have only Quark and Pagemaker to choose from, and will choose quark each and every time. I have never had any problems with quark, and can make pdfs with no problem and have never had it crash on me or mangle a job. Perhaps it’s my soothing trackball skills.. i do not know. Because my boss refuses to put any money into this department, we have to either turn away Indesign jobs, have them redo it it pagemaker or quark or send us a hi res pdf in color seps. My problem, since I started, has been with the stupid blue and white G3’s that are as old as I am and sometime resemble stephen king’s christine… I need an old priest and a young priest… I hve indesign at home, and do prefer it, but unfortunately, i dont’ work at home, i work here… in hell.
(:3