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1. Re: A response to Mark Mapes
Mark Mapes Jan 23, 2011 8:01 PM (in response to Hem12345)Yes sir, we are well aware that some newer laptops do not have Firewire ports and, moreover, that the majority of new file-based cameras do not output via Firewire. So adding support in OnLocation for other types of connections is naturally a high priority for us.
Where you are off the mark is in asserting that "Adobe ... expect[s] users to continue using a practically obsolete format like FireWire" and implying that we either aren't aware of technological trends or don't care about remaining on top of those trends. If a product does not meet a customer's evolving needs--for whatever reason--I for one do not expect that customer to buy the product anyway and wait for Adobe to catch up. To the contrary, we're well aware that we risk losing that customer's business. That, after all, is the essence of capitalism.
We put out the best software that we can, adding as many new features and improving performance and stability as much as possible with each passing development cycle. Do we always deliver everything that's on our roadmap in a given release? Of course not. Maybe development takes longer than anticipated, or personnel changes hinder progres, or other priorities crop up that steal time from the cycle. And keep in mind that products in Adobe's Creative Suite are released simultaneously. That means that if a feature is not ready for prime time, we can't simply slip the release date.
Put another way, the development cycle sometimes forces very difficult decisions. The toughest choice for us on the OnLocation team in the CS5 cycle was to not include capture card support. We anticipated that some customers would be disappointed or even angry that we were not able to deliver that support, and clearly had 20/20 foresight in that regard.
Having re-read the post in question several times,* I'm honestly at a loss to comprehend how you are interpreting my words as blowing anybody off. As I interpreted it, the post I was responding to basically asked whether OnLocation was going to support HDMI. Since it's company policy to not discuss future development on the public forums, I replied that "I'm not at liberty to discuss whether a given feature is under development." In such cases, I usually add something along the lines of "We're aware of the demand for this feature and it's in our feature database," which for some reason I neglected to include on that occasion.


