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Affinity products for Linux


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Less of the personal comments please, stick to the topic and follow the forum guidelines. 

Patrick Connor
Serif Europe Ltd

"There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man. True nobility lies in being superior to your previous self."  W. L. Sheldon

 

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22 hours ago, tonyrh said:

So his "local college" is teaching people how to use MS Office... it's a special-needs-college or what? Isn't a college supposed to provide a pretty high level of education? Down here are called universities, maybe I'm mixing things up? Or maybe he meant "local kindergarten"?

His comment "it's just web stuff" made me spit out my coffee... he should switch "professional" career to "professional" comedy!

 

So, you have insulted all Apple Mac users. ECDL graduates, and now all Microsoft Office graduates. Is there anyone else that you have contempt for ? 

 

I wonder what all the professional users of Access, Powerpoint, Excel, Word and Outlook users think of you? You might not know it, but there are millions of professional people who use MS Office products every day. Lawyers, accountants, scientists and so forth.

 

P.S. I can guess what they think, but I won't repeat it here.

 

PPS. I have just received my Affinity Photo Workbook for my Windows (10 professional) version of Affinity Photo. A shame you niche market Linux users can't run such brilliant, professional quality software. I can truly understand why you are desperate for something a bit more professional. Which is of course, what this thread is all about.;)

Windows PCs. Photo and Designer, latest non-beta versions.

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On 25/11/2017 at 3:12 PM, tonyrh said:

So his "local college" is teaching people how to use MS Office... it's a special-needs-college or what? Isn't a college supposed to provide a pretty high level of education? Down here are called universities, maybe I'm mixing things up? Or maybe he meant "local kindergarten"?

His comment "it's just web stuff" made me spit out my coffee... he should switch "professional" career to "professional" comedy!

Are you referring to something in this thread? I cannot see any reference to this in recent posts. It does help to use the Quote button. 

If someone wanted to learn MS-office, then where would they go other than their local college? Most people are not self-taught (like me).

 

 

Windows 10, Affinity Photo 1.10.5 Designer 1.10.5 and Publisher 1.10.5 (mainly Photo), now ex-Adobe CC

CPU: AMD A6-3670. RAM: 16 GB DDR3 @ 666MHz, Graphics: 2047MB NVIDIA GeForce GT 630

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  • 4 weeks later...

Honestly guys...

At my company we are using both Macs and Linux, the only reason for the Macs being around that there are not many options for graphic designers on Linux and they need something that can open a PSD. My colleagues are mostly frontend web developers, meaning they do Javascript, SCSS, PHP and graphics design. And were it not for graphics design, we would dump the Macs altogether. Most of the time they are doing Mac command line stuff anyway, with gulp and grunt and git and docker and what not. The point being that they are using the unix stuff MacOSX is based on anyway.

 

About market shares of MacOSX: If we could dump it, we would immediately. But we can't, because there's no graphics software on Linux that they WANT to use. Gravit is coming though. Affinity Designer/Photo is not.

 

And about the "Linux is for nerds" rhetoric:
Ten years ago I used to think just like this, from what I saw. Accounting used Windows, Graphics Designers used Macs, and the longhaired Klingon in the basement who kept the servers running had Linux. It's still a cliché, but it's not always like this today. E.g., there is a reasonable share of developers who are ALSO pretty neat graphics designers, and vice versa. That's the type I wrote about above.

 

That said, I for myself bought Affinity Designer and Photo a few days ago. For Mac, because there isn't a release for Linux. I don't see how marketing for Linux users would be different. You wouldn't be targeting the linux enthusiasts, the experimentalists, the Raspberry Pi tinkerers anyway. You would be targeting the web developers and creatives who are out there already.

Edited by basemod
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1 hour ago, basemod said:

I don't see how marketing for Linux users would be different. You wouldn't be targeting the linux enthusiasts, the experimentalists, the Raspberry Pi tinkerers anyway. You would be targeting the web developers and creatives who are out there already.

This has been beaten to death already, but you are avoiding the most important point, that being if the size of this market is large enough to justify the expense & diversion of resources for Serif/Affinity to develop Linux versions.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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4 hours ago, R C-R said:

This has been beaten to death already, but you are avoiding the most important point, that being if the size of this market is large enough to justify the expense & diversion of resources for Serif/Affinity to develop Linux versions.

Actually, on Linux there would be MUCH less competition for Affinity apps.

Personally, if I was still Linux user I would buy Affinity Photo and Designer in an instant.

I'm not advocating for Linux version because I realize it is not really a question of money, but rather lack of man-power.

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-- Edited --- (by me, SrPx)

AD, AP and APub. V1.10.6 and V2.4 Windows 10 and Windows 11. 
Ryzen 9 3900X, 32 GB RAM,  RTX 3060 12GB, Wacom Intuos XL, Wacom L. Eizo ColorEdge CS 2420 monitor. Windows 10 Pro.
(Laptop) HP Omen 16-b1010ns 12700H, 32GB DDR5, nVidia RTX 3060 6GB + Huion Kamvas 22 pen display, Windows 11 Pro.

 

 

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6 hours ago, Merde said:

Actually, on Linux there would be MUCH less competition for Affinity apps.

Which makes wonder: if there really is this huge untapped, potentially highly profitable market for commercial graphics apps that run natively on Linux, then why hasn't Adobe been interested in exploiting it? The company clearly isn't lacking the resources to do that, nor is it averse to raking in more profits at the expense of the competition.

 

What seems more plausible, that Adobe somehow overlooked this market or that they ran the numbers & determined that it really would not be profitable enough to justify doing?

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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3 minutes ago, R C-R said:

What seems more plausible, that Adobe somehow overlooked this market or that they ran the numbers & determined that it really would not be profitable enough to justify doing?

 

Not to mention the fact that at the prices they charge, Adobe would make far more money than Serif would. Probably !

Windows PCs. Photo and Designer, latest non-beta versions.

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  • 3 weeks later...

If I may, from my experience as a long time Linux user who went back to Windows because of scarcity of design software available for the platform,

 

I don't mean to be rude or anything but from what I observed the main problem of Linux could be Linux users themselves as there are too many conservatives who would not allow proprietary code on their system. That's what I see as the main issue. Aside from that everyone knows that Linux is much more robust, stable and secure than Windows or Mac but also less marketed than both which is why most companies cater to mainstream platforms to generate revenue.

 

It's true, that Linux powers governments, banks, schools and many other important institutions. Your websites run on it, your servers run on it, your phones use the Linux kernel, ATM contains software developed on Linux and I could go on, but again, the main problem I see is the Linux community itself. Mac is a closed platform, period. Windows same, which is why it's easier to target them.

 

The way I see it there are only 3 options:

  • get a Mac
  • run WINE, PlayOnLinux or a virtual machine with Windows
  • dual boot with Windows where you do your work on Windows and general computing for security and privacy on Linux
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32 minutes ago, Inoki said:

Aside from that everyone knows that Linux is much more robust, stable and secure than Windows or Mac ...

Nonsense. Any OS can be misconfigured such that its stability & security will be compromised.

 

34 minutes ago, Inoki said:

Your websites run on it, your servers run on it, your phones use the Linux kernel ...

My phone certainly does not use a Linux kernel & a great many websites & servers use something other than Linux.

 

36 minutes ago, Inoki said:

Mac is a closed platform, period.

Nope. True, it includes many proprietary API's & opaque processes, but there is much that is well documented & accessible to anyone willing to wade through the developer docs.

 

If sweeping generalizations like these are representative of the greater Linux community, maybe you are right about that being the main problem.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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On 1/10/2018 at 7:44 AM, R C-R said:

 

My phone certainly does not use a Linux kernel & a great many websites & servers use something other than Linux.

 

 

 

Im sorry for the necro but this I had to comment on. 

 

This statement is pretty well wrong, unless you use a Windows phone or the cheapest garbage phone possible you guaranteed have either the Linux kernel or a Unix kernel, thats just plain fact of the matter (iOS and Linux are Unix based systems)

 

Second, Linux/Unix flat dominates the web, it runs everything minus a hand full of people running maybe windows server which I'm not 100% sure Amazon, Google, Facebook, etc., Everything you've come to use every day, the servers that got you here, all likely run Linux (and the 3 listed actually do and contribute to it) . Being conservative 90% of the web you know is Unix/Linux, 10% is Microsoft/Other. 

 

Linux isn't supported simply because of the slew of ignorance and misconception displayed throughout this thread permeates to the software industry that perpetuates these ideas. Linux isn't an unknown, it's everywhere, just not as much in homes. There isn't a reason it can't be supported, just most companies don't want to because of the idea "Linux is for nerds" and other such things expressed here. It's a mindset issue not a technical issue, period.

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3 hours ago, Echoa said:

This statement is pretty well wrong, unless you use a Windows phone or the cheapest garbage phone possible you guaranteed have either the Linux kernel or a Unix kernel, thats just plain fact of the matter (iOS and Linux are Unix based systems)

Nope. iOS is, like the Mac OS (& to some extent Linux), a UNIX-like OS, but there are fundamental differences among all of them that make saying they are all "based on" the same thing at the kernel (or any other) level a gross oversimplification. For example, in the Apple OS's I/O operations rely on a modular, layered, dynamic runtime architecture, much of which is not resident in kernel space. Among other things, this is why until recently iOS provided no direct access to the file system at all, & even now it is strictly limited to operations that are very difficult for malware to exploit. Other fundamental differences include the implementations of the memory management & VM systems, & the Windowing systems.

 

So in a sense, sure, you can say iOS is a 'Unix-based system', but it is neither particularly meaningful or accurate.

 

3 hours ago, Echoa said:

Linux isn't supported simply because of the slew of ignorance and misconception displayed throughout this thread permeates to the software industry that perpetuates these ideas.

So to clarify, are you saying that the software industry itself is somehow ignorant of the supposed benefits of coding for Linux? If so, do you think that might possibly be just a wee bit over-the-top & appear to be yet another gross oversimplification that those in the industry (like Serif/Affinity) are likely to ignore?

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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-- Edited --- (by me, SrPx)

AD, AP and APub. V1.10.6 and V2.4 Windows 10 and Windows 11. 
Ryzen 9 3900X, 32 GB RAM,  RTX 3060 12GB, Wacom Intuos XL, Wacom L. Eizo ColorEdge CS 2420 monitor. Windows 10 Pro.
(Laptop) HP Omen 16-b1010ns 12700H, 32GB DDR5, nVidia RTX 3060 6GB + Huion Kamvas 22 pen display, Windows 11 Pro.

 

 

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1 hour ago, R C-R said:

Nope. iOS is, like the Mac OS (& to some extent Linux), a UNIX-like OS, but there are fundamental differences among all of them that make saying they are all "based on" the same thing at the kernel (or any other) level a gross oversimplification. For example, in the Apple OS's I/O operations rely on a modular, layered, dynamic runtime architecture, much of which is not resident in kernel space. Among other things, this is why until recently iOS provided no direct access to the file system at all, & even now it is strictly limited to operations that are very difficult for malware to exploit. Other fundamental differences include the implementations of the memory management & VM systems, & the Windowing systems.

 

So in a sense, sure, you can say iOS is a 'Unix-based system', but it is neither particularly meaningful or accurate.

 

So to clarify, are you saying that the software industry itself is somehow ignorant of the supposed benefits of coding for Linux? If so, do you think that might possibly be just a wee bit over-the-top & appear to be yet another gross oversimplification that those in the industry (like Serif/Affinity) are likely to ignore?

 

No I'm referring to the consumer ignorance and the software industry following the consumer, which isn't necessarily bad because you follow your money but it hurts adoption of alternatives like Linux.

 

iOS and OSX can run most of the same things Linux, BSD, and Unix can. They're all part of the Unix family with alot of commonality. They are at their hearts Unix systems, they act like, respond to same commands, etc. Just like a Unix system. They are even listed as Unix derivatives under the Unix family of systems, XNU (Aka OSx), Linux,BSD, all Unix and all siblings  The differences come down to ideology regarding UI/user experience, security, and infrastructure. It is alot easier to go from OSx to Linux than it is to go to windows because 90% of the work is done already when you target OSx (the graphical shell and anything tied to apple specific API being the only real issues), you just have to account for difference in things like how they deal with drivers,etc.  Simply put, if you work like Unix, respond like Unix, you're Unix regardless of the mask you put on it (OSx is even Unix certified)

 

There is no reason a Linux version couldn't be made as they deal with Unix systems already, the consumer mindeset just isn't there regarding Linux, so they don't want to risk a market that isn't a guarantee. There is no technical reason they can't do it.

 

Edit: in response to the long comment above this. It really is the fault of the Linux community as a whole that they haven't entered the consumer space in force. It's only in the last 10yrs or so that several distros have put a huge focus on the common user. It's almost too little too late. Maybe it could change and software companies might gain interest, but the community took so long to realize they might maybe need to change that they continue to stay relegated to the "for nerds" space to this day.

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47 minutes ago, Echoa said:

Edit: in response to the long comment above this. It really is the fault of the Linux community as a whole that they haven't entered the consumer space in force. It's only in the last 10yrs or so that several distros have put a huge focus on the common user. It's almost too little too late. Maybe it could change and software companies might gain interest, but the community took so long to realize they might maybe need to change that they continue to stay relegated to the "for nerds" space to this day.

 

Yes, thats about it.

 

In the print trade I got asked to print files from all sorts of weird software and odd platforms. Acorn, MacOS, Windows even Amiga. But never once Linux. And yet, over 10 years ago the other platforms were well established for graphic arts users. Mainly Mac and PC, 10 years on, virtually nothing has changed.

 

When I was more interested in Linux, about 10 years back I thought (and hoped) it would make a big impact. But 10 years on, nobody I know uses it (except my daughter because I gave her a laptop with it on). When this debate started I asked people I know, at random, and they either hadn't heard of it, or thought it was just for Internet stuff and geeks. And for the most part, that is true.

 

It doesn't matter how much Linux is actually used under the surface, The typical home user doesn't know or care, They just go to their local shop and buy a Windows PC. PC shops prefer to sell more Windows machines with maintenance agreements, anti-virus software, maintenance software and breakdown insurance to boost profits. To them Linux is a  total waste of time.

 

Personally, I think the abundance of free stuff is a big part of the problem. As well as being labeled as geeks, users are labeled as mean. And where is the profit in dealing with mean people ?

 

Windows PCs. Photo and Designer, latest non-beta versions.

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-- Edited --- (by me, SrPx)

AD, AP and APub. V1.10.6 and V2.4 Windows 10 and Windows 11. 
Ryzen 9 3900X, 32 GB RAM,  RTX 3060 12GB, Wacom Intuos XL, Wacom L. Eizo ColorEdge CS 2420 monitor. Windows 10 Pro.
(Laptop) HP Omen 16-b1010ns 12700H, 32GB DDR5, nVidia RTX 3060 6GB + Huion Kamvas 22 pen display, Windows 11 Pro.

 

 

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8 hours ago, Echoa said:

Simply put, if you work like Unix, respond like Unix, you're Unix regardless of the mask you put on it (OSx is even Unix certified)

Nope. Neither POSIX nor SUS v3 certification make an OS a Unix OS. Again, this is yet another gross oversimplification.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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8 hours ago, Echoa said:

 

No I'm referring to the consumer ignorance and the software industry following the consumer,....

You've got that backwards - consumer choices were based on the availability of the software, which in turn was based on the ease of writing, publishing and making money from that software.  By the time Linux was anywhere near being a viable option the potential customers had already established their positions elsewhere.  I can remember being involved in Microsoft v Apple strategy meetings in the 1980s - years before Linux had even been thought of!

AP, AD & APub user, running Win10

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-- Edited --- (by me, SrPx)

AD, AP and APub. V1.10.6 and V2.4 Windows 10 and Windows 11. 
Ryzen 9 3900X, 32 GB RAM,  RTX 3060 12GB, Wacom Intuos XL, Wacom L. Eizo ColorEdge CS 2420 monitor. Windows 10 Pro.
(Laptop) HP Omen 16-b1010ns 12700H, 32GB DDR5, nVidia RTX 3060 6GB + Huion Kamvas 22 pen display, Windows 11 Pro.

 

 

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13 hours ago, IanSG said:

You've got that backwards - consumer choices were based on the availability of the software, which in turn was based on the ease of writing, publishing and making money from that software.  By the time Linux was anywhere near being a viable option the potential customers had already established their positions elsewhere.  I can remember being involved in Microsoft v Apple strategy meetings in the 1980s - years before Linux had even been thought of!

 

 

Back in the late 80s/early 90s is when the "Mac is for designers" idea even started. For a while before nearly every home had a computer it was kinda true, but that hasn't been the case for 20yrs. It's not backwards to refer to the case of software today vs 20yrs ago. 

Then you absolutely would've been talking about windows vs Mac in a meeting, but Linux was an infant then and windows had been a UI over MS-DOS (that hasn't been a thing since XP).

Today's landscape is different, the Linux is finally a viable option, windows is from the ground up entirely different, and OSx while still being Unix based is far more custom than it once was. This day and age not including Linux as a possibility comes down to where consumers are/look, and most still think if you run Linux "isn't that for hackers and like computer geniuses?". When for 10yrs with the likes of Ubuntu have been focusing on user experience but that's what people think, so that's what software developers looking at prosumer and consumer space go with. 

 

Linux is realistically perfectly capable option, but the consumer mindeset and base simply isn't there as far as companies view it, and logically they follow the money that's guaranteed. 

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14 hours ago, R C-R said:

Nope. Neither POSIX nor SUS v3 certification make an OS a Unix OS. Again, this is yet another gross oversimplification.

 

Unix by definition is the family of OS derivative of the original ATT Bell labs, with OSx (iOS in turn) being considered the Unix with the largest install base, you can look into it if you like or believe it's not true I don't care. "Unix-like" (which really just means they didn't pay for Unix certification) systems like Linux are derivative of Unix (again responding like it,etc. But not directly using original Unix code), and in turn Android runs atop Linux.

 

Believe what you want, but that is what it is, that is part of what makes porting between them so relatively simple. I'm not much interested in simple "nope you're wrong" answers if I'm going tbh, so substantiate what you're saying besides just saying no because everything else seems to disagree with your statement.

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20 minutes ago, SrPx said:

I don't think is a static situation, tho.

There is no doubt about that. A very long time ago an operating system provided little more than a way to move data onto & off of disks. Now, we expect them to support a huge & ever growing number of system services, most of which manipulate the data itself. We expect them to do this securely, conforming to a wide variety of standards that are sometimes contradictory or incompletely defined. Some of us want the unrestricted freedom to configure them however we want, including in ways that can severely compromise their stability & security; others want a turnkey system that is not only fully configured out-of-the-box but also locked down to prevent us from doing anything that in any way might compromise them.

 

So the big question is which OS handles all this best, & the answer is that none of them do, because there is no "best" that everyone will ever agree on.

All 3 1.10.8, & all 3 V2.4.1 Mac apps; 2020 iMac 27"; 3.8GHz i7, Radeon Pro 5700, 32GB RAM; macOS 10.15.7
Affinity Photo 
1.10.8; Affinity Designer 1.108; & all 3 V2 apps for iPad; 6th Generation iPad 32 GB; Apple Pencil; iPadOS 15.7

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