{"id":12623,"date":"2008-01-15T21:42:16","date_gmt":"2008-01-15T21:42:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.adobe.com\/jnackdev\/2008\/01\/gridiron-flow-ridiculously-cool-workflow-management.html"},"modified":"2008-01-15T21:42:16","modified_gmt":"2008-01-15T21:42:16","slug":"gridiron_flow_ridiculously_cool_workflow_m","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/jnack.com\/blog\/2008\/01\/15\/gridiron_flow_ridiculously_cool_workflow_m\/","title":{"rendered":"GridIron Flow: Ridiculously cool workflow management"},"content":{"rendered":"

Unless you buy After Effects plug-ins<\/a>, you’ve probably never heard of GridIron Software.  That’ll change.  This small Ottawa-based developer has unveiled one of the slickest, most potentially transformative applications I’ve seen in years.  My enthusiasm comes from what it could mean to Photoshop & Creative Suite customers. <\/p>\n

Called GridIron Flow<\/strong><\/a>, the new software is designed to give you “Mind of God” knowledge of where your files are, how they’re related<\/em>, how long you’ve been working on them, etc.  It consists of two things: a system process that runs in the background, tracking events while consuming minimal resources; and a front-end application (see this pair<\/a> of screenshots<\/a>) that displays files & data about them.<\/p>\n

Let’s say you copy some vectors from Illustrator and paste them into Photoshop.  Flow, running invisibly in the background, notices the event and sees that there’s a relationship between the AI and PSD files.  When you pop open the Flow browser, you can see a connection between the files–even though Photoshop & Illustrator themselves don’t store or track a link.<\/p>\n

If you then place the PSD into, say, After Effects, create an AEP file, and then render an FLV, Flow will create a workflow map<\/a>–a chain of connections from one file\/project to the next.  Right-click any of these files in your Finder\/Explorer & Flow will show how they’re related.  If you try to move or delete a file, Flow will pop a message to mention that the file is related to others, offering to show the relationship.  Upshot<\/u>: fewer broken links due to accidentally misplacing assets. <\/p>\n

Okay, that’s cool, but it gets more interesting.  Now let’s say you edit your PSD a little, save, edit, save, etc.  Flow (not unlike Apple’s Time Machine) can be automatically versioning your files.  Although only the current version shows up in your Finder\/Explorer, in the Flow UI you can see previous versions<\/a>.  You can use a movie-style scrubber to move your project back in time.<\/p>\n

Here’s why this is a big deal<\/u>: All the data collection and versioning is automatic<\/em> and invisible<\/em>, which is the only way designers will benefit from it.  Creative people want to create<\/em>, not type in metadata, fill out timesheets, etc.  If you force them to do data entry; to work in highly regimented projects; or to use wonky, restrictive tools for check-in\/check-out, they’ll generally kick like mules.  (I know: I did just the same thing.)  The beauty of Flow is that it’s like an airbag–unobtrusive unless and until you need it. <\/p>\n

I think that if you’ve ever used multiple design tools together, when you see Flow in action you’ll get the value in a hurry.  (I’m told GridIron will post a demo video soon, as that’ll make things much clearer.)  I’m waxing their cars pretty hard, so let me say for the record that I don’t have any formal relationship with these guys.  I was really excited by the concept when I saw an early version last summer, and we’ve been talking with GridIron about how to make Adobe tools play really nicely with Flow.<\/p>\n

If this sounds like it’s up your alley, check out the additional feature notes<\/a> on their site, and maybe sign up for the beta program<\/a> that’s starting this spring. <\/p>\n

PS–The GridIron guys have created a cute little video<\/a> that sets up the problem they’re trying to solve.  I like that “goatee” has become universal shorthand for “designer.” \ud83d\ude09<\/em> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Unless you buy After Effects plug-ins, you’ve probably never heard of GridIron Software.  That’ll change.  This small Ottawa-based developer has unveiled one of the slickest, most potentially transformative applications I’ve seen in years.  My enthusiasm comes from what it could mean to Photoshop & Creative Suite customers. Called GridIron Flow, the new software is designed to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/jnack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12623"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/jnack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/jnack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jnack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jnack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12623"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/jnack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12623\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/jnack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jnack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jnack.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}