Hello Jakob, (I've read the other replies to this post also.) Like Bernard A., I too am at the annual FrameMaker Chautauqua. (A great venue for new info and easy access to experts; I highly recommend it!)
Adobe flew in at least three of the developers from their facility in India for this event. I had an interesting discussion with them this evening. (By the way I worked for Frame Technology for 5.5 years). My private conclusion, after the discussion, is that it is just possible that there are now more developers working on FrameMaker than at any time in its history, including pre-Adobe days. When Frame Technology was an independent entity before the Adobe acquisition, there were arguably more "bodies" in the engineering department, but a significant amount of that staff was dedicated to just porting FrameMaker to the many disparate UNIX platforms so common in those days. Enormous QA staff were mandated by the many platforms, (NeXT, SCO, OpenLook, X/Motif et al), which have thankfully come and gone. With fewer platforms to test and manage, Adobe is now able to concentrate on really improving FrameMaker and potentially integrating it with even more solutions. The recent integration of FrameMaker with Robohelp and Captivate is astonishing and opens up incredible new vistas for the product in the e_Learning space. Adobe has a solid, experienced team of FrameMaker developers that have proven themselves with astonishing results over the past few years. The introduction of UNICODE was a huge milestone, not half appreciated enough outside of the translation industry, where I work. Due to the seamless integration of UNICODE on all levels, new users in Russia, Poland, Greece and other regions with formerly unsupported languages can now take full advantage of FrameMaker's many gifts. This opens up the door for FrameMaker to truly become a significant force in publishing and DITA on a truly global level. FrameMaker's current developers and product management team are highly proactive in seeking out user feedback: they monitor input on major online forums and welcome face-to-face feedback at significant venues they attend in North America and elsewhere. FYI -- I attended at least two conferences last year in which Adobe was the *only* vendor present to have developers in the booth! Naturally, I cannot touch on what I confidentially discussed with the developers tonight, but suffice it to say that in my opinion, FrameMaker has never been more "alive," nor had a more promising future than it does today, in Feb 2008. I have worked with FrameMaker continuously for 20 years, as of this August. I was even the product marketing manager for FrameMaker V3.0 and V3.5. Like many on this forum, I briefly had concerns about the product's future 8 or 9 years ago, but those unsubstantiated fears evaporated long ago. I know that the "death of FrameMaker" rumors will probably resurface again, not unlike that 1960s urban myth about the woman who died from a Black Widow spider bite in her bee hive hairdo! A word to the wise; the next time you hear such rumors, ignore them. FrameMaker is here to stay, and as far as product management and development go, my favorite product has never been in better hands. p.s. I had dinner with FrameMaker's inventor, Charles Corefield, a couple of months ago, and he confessed that he too has never been more confident about FrameMaker's future. "Does that answer your question?" ;-) My last post on this subject. Maxwell Hoffmann Production Lead Welocalize Tel. 503.274.2211 Mob. 301.693.7728 Fax: 503.274.2611 www.welocalize.com -----Original Message----- From: Jakob Fix [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Thursday, February 14, 2008 7:47 AM To: Framers List Subject: future of FrameMaker Hello, I would like to know if anybody has some reliable first-hand information about the future of FrameMaker. I have recently heard of people having attended Adobe training sessions for FrameMaker that Adobe may/will probably stop FrameMaker development. As the organization I am working for is a big user of FrameMaker (but we don't currently have any direct contacts with Adobe), we are getting slightly worried about the future. Any insights will be greatly appreciated. -- cheers, Jakob.
