Ah, another Venturian! (well, I was, but haven't done any work with it for some years now)
Re VMs: I like VirtualBox, because the VM can have access to USB devices, like scanners and such. Microsoft's offering, AFIK, doesn't do that. Regards Jay On 4/26/2012 2:28 PM, Jacob Sch?ffer (Grafikhuset) wrote: > Over the years I've had quite a few conversations with Gabor Jahn, Allan > Shearer, Abe Hendin and Paul McGee, to which Jay Maechtlen's FAQ link refer > in many of the FAQ answers. These folks have done a great job and I can > still see their wisdom engulfed in passionate Ventura flames. Consult the > Ventura News Groups if they still are alive. These guys have all provided > plenty of useful information to the Ventura communities. > > If one has the option of installing Ventura 10 and is able to apply the > official and *very* important VP10 patch the only reasonable thing to do > with pre-Venrura 5 documents (i.e. 4.2 and older) is to open them in VP10, > modify the para-styles as required (typically only font references and > perhaps tracking/kerning fail), and then, page by page, check that > hyphenation is OK (which it most likely isn't - especially if you work with > a non-English (ie. non-en-US or non-en-GB) languages. > > If you are on Windows 7 don't fight the VP10 Installer. It IS possible to > make it run and install VP10, but it's waste of time. Use a VM-Ware (or > similar virtualization method - perhaps the MS Virtual PC, which is free) to > run a Windows XP session with Ventura 10. THAT will work for you. > > In my view we today have MANY products that can do ALMOST the same as > Ventura Publisher in regard to automated publishing books. We have NONE that > CAN do the same with regard to automating such bests, and not even InDesign > can deal with for example text frames with different column widths in a text > frame nor with automatically created vertical column lines, that match the > height of balanced text, automatically feathering space above headings etc. > Ventura did that from version 2.0 run under the GEM platform in 1988-89, and > still do in VP10, of course. I think Ventura died because document > portability was extremely poor and the leaning curve was too steep. Sad! > > Anyway, from time to time I still use Ventura (10.0 with patch applied) on > some occations, and have just made a 416 pages book ready to print in 3,5 > hours with Ventura. The ability to just load "tagged" TXT files marked for > "Export on Save" on the fly simply outmatch other technologies because of > ease of use, simplicty etc. - if you know the "how to". If you still have VP > 4.X books alive, then keep them in VP format. NOTHING else makes sense unles > you are willing to undertake a huge amount of superfluous work. > > I loved Ventura, but I also love newer technologies for their fantastic > integration with PDF, non-EPS artwork and image handling etc.. But these > "packages" still have a bit to learn from Ventura in many regards, even > though for example the latest FrameMaker, at long last, beats Ventura on > some fronts. > > It took almost a human generation for FrameMaker to provide usefull > CMYK/Spot color support. It's here now, and most critical, it also works OK > now - at last. The first CMYK attempts with Adobe trying to get off lightly > by implementing an outdated Linux kernel (Level 1 based PostScript) was a > total disaster, and exporting the FM development to India didn't exactly > make it easy to find common development ground with internal Adobe colour > experts. Anyway, the FM10 (latest edition and patch level) does a great job > with commercial CMYK/Spot colors owing to third party input (Arnis Gubins > and friends - thanks Arnis for unifying the strength of third party > collaboration !!!). > > VP10, FM10, FM10 ten years after VP10 ten years after Xerox VP. There's a > lot of 10's to keep tally of here, isn't there :-) > > Well, I'm actually writing all this rubbish just to anounce, that my colour > conversion products "Colour Chameleon", "CMYK PDF Creator" and "Publi PDF" > is becoming freeware licensed under some sort of GPL as a single product > named "Grafikhuset Publi PDF". All of these variants have helped FrameMaker > users all over the world for years in preparing coloured FM documents for > commercial printing via PDF since January 1996, where the first > International English "Colour Chameleon" was released. > > We have now closed the on-line activation service (hosted by InstallShield - > Flexera), and licensed products can NOT be activated anymore. However, we > have a FREE client edition of "Grafikhuset Publi PDF 2.0" prepared that run > on XP, Vista and Windows 7 (32- and 64-bit editions of Windows 7), and is > currently preparing the MSI installer. We expect to provide this new version > for FREE via http://go.grafikhuset.dk approx 5. May 2012. > > All the best / Med venlig hilsen > Jacob Sch?ffer | Chief Developer > Grafikhuset (House of Graphics) > Paradis All? 22, Raml?se > DK-3200 Helsinge, Denmark > Mobile: +45 2021 1958 > Email: js at grafikhuset.dk > Web: go.grafikhuset.dk > > > -- Jay Maechtlen 626 444-5112 office 626 840-8875 cell www.laserpubs.com
