Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!yale!cmcl2!esquire!baumgart
From: baumgart@esquire.dpw.com (Steve Baumgarten)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: info about DesignStudio?
Message-ID: <1790@esquire.UUCP>
Date: 15 Feb 90 18:31:39 GMT
References: <BA1DTLS@xavier.swarthmore.edu> <1782@esquire.UUCP> <38641@apple.Apple.COM>
Sender: news@esquire.UUCP
Reply-To: baumgart@esquire.dpw.com (Steve Baumgarten)
Organization: Davis Polk & Wardwell
Lines: 47
In-reply-to: chuq@Apple.COM (Chuq Von Rospach)

In article <38641@apple.Apple.COM>, chuq@Apple (Chuq Von Rospach) writes:
>>LetraSet's "Bug fixes? What bug fixes?" policy has been a real
>>problem; Microsoft products may have earned a reputation for being
>>troublesome, but at least Excel doesn't bomb if you use the RAM cache.
>
>My favorite RSG 4.5 bug is that if you use RSG 4.5 and Superclock (actually,
>anything that goes in and puts stuff on the menubar like superclock does)
>RSG will corrupt memory. This one caused me no end of problems. Letraset's
>response was that the problems I was seeing weren't possible (I'm not
>kidding, that was their official position). Later, after I gave up and
>switched, someone else tracked it down to an interaction between RSG and
>SuperClock (which I use). Letraset's official response was "don't use
>menubar clocks". When told we wanted to use menubar clocks, Letraset's
>response was "spend $50 on a real clock."

Yeah, they're real helpful at LetraSet.  My personal favorite was
their response to the RAM cache problem.  It consisted of a README
file that suggested that you turn off the RAM cache before using the
program, since RSG was incompatible with it.  Nice fix, guys.

>I was a very happy RSG 3.0 user. I was a happy RSG 4.0 user. I'm now an
>exceptionally happy ex-RSG user who loves PageMaker. I plan on keeping it
>that way. Their 'support' is ludicrous and they keep coming up with these
>wonderful ideas -- things like copy protection of their fonts, building a
>program that requires their proprietary fonts -- that really make me want to
>deal with the company. 

To be fair, the copy-protection and stuff applies to LetraStudio,
their typeface program.  I think they dropped it (or are dropping
it?) and I've heard they're going to support Bitstream fonts as well.

And one other thing in RSG's defense: I used PageMaker recently as was
greatly inconvienced by its slowness and its inability to work with
more than one document at a time.  Also, I simply couldn't believe the
size of its files!  At least the size of RSG files bear some relation
to their contents, but PageMaker files are just hundreds and hundreds
of K, seemingly no matter what's in them.

But Chuq's absolutely right about LetraSet's support.  It's either
nonexistent or it sucks.  Depending on when you call them and what
it's about, you get one or the other.

--
   Steve Baumgarten             | "New York... when civilization falls apart,
   Davis Polk & Wardwell        |  remember, we were way ahead of you."
   baumgart@esquire.dpw.com     | 
   cmcl2!esquire!baumgart       |                           - David Letterman