As I mentioned recently, I asked some of the Adobe staff responsible for designing, building, and managing the company’s installers to provide feedback on the concerns and criticisms we’ve heard regarding CS3 and CS4. In this post’s extended entry, first Barry Hills & then Eric Wilde from the Suite engineering group share their thoughts. –J.
All-
I lead the Engineering teams for Creative Suites shared technologies which includes the Installers.
John Nack provides a tremendous service to the Adobe community with this blog by encouraging honest and open communication about the goings on at Adobe, our apps and our product development. I sincerely appreciate the lively discussion here and am happy to engage directly with any of you on the issues and concerns raised.
In every product cycle, we take comments from our customers very seriously for all products and features. Installers are no different.
For all of you who want to see the CS installers improve in CS5 and beyond, I am the one to whom to direct your issues, concerns and questions (I have included my contact info at the end of this note).
We are always looking for more customers to engage with to understand how to improve your workflows and overall experience so if you send me your contact information, I will be happy to call you up to discuss in person. I very much appreciate your direct feedback as it is what helps us make better products.
In CS3, there were some serious problems that customers faced and the time it took to resolve those issues in customer support made the initial experience with CS3 painful for some customers.
In CS4, the responsibility for CS installers came into my organization and we focused almost all of our development time on one thing: make the installer experience more robust so that the vast majority of customers could install the software successfully and start using CS4 apps without any issues.
There was work done on performance and the good news is that while the data transfer rate was improved in almost all cases, the bad news is that we are installing more apps and files in CS4 so net install times are slower in some of the Suites.
We are looking at various ways to install less and allow more choices of what gets installed in CS5 to improve net installation times.
And YES! I agree that we should not require 3rd party apps to shut down before installing (we do need to close Suite apps). I have an RSS feed on this “bug” and am following it closely. I understand why there was a desire to reduce the chances of installer conflicts with open apps, but I am strongly on the side of being able to browse the web and do other things while you are installing.
In addition to the focus on installer robustness, there was also a concerted effort on making the actual tech support experience better if you did encounter a problem which has enabled more effective problem resolution.
For example we created an AIR-based utility which will review the installer log and automatically point you to the Tech Note that applies to the issue you have. If that doesn’t resolve the issue it packages up the installer log file so your tech support experience is streamlined.
In CS4, we did not focus on several of the user experience and multi-machine install issues that are referenced in some of these messages. That will be a priority for CS5.
Installing an application to a HDD… it sounds obvious and trivial (I often see the ‘why not just copy *.*?’). The reality is that there are limitations in the OS provided installer technology and package management systems that are problematic for the Creative Suite (particularly when uninstalling the shared libraries which support the tight integration between products).
Despite the criticisms of the CS4 installers (and some are quite valid), there are 51% fewer Technical Support Installer related calls in CS4 vs. CS3 over the same period.
We certainly know we have a ways to go before talking about ‘how much the installer sucks’ is a thing of the past, but there are a lot fewer frustrated customers these days.
I am quite serious when I ask you to contact me directly if you are so inclined. I may not tell you what you want to hear but I will be open, honest and take your issues seriously and use that information to influence the CS5 plans.
I have had a couple of good exchanges with John Welch. While colorful and not very shy, he has a lot of great insights on what is needed to improve the installers for multi-machine/IT environments. The CS5 Installer team is meeting with him in December and I anticipate that we will have a productive discussion with the outcome being a positive influence on what we do in CS5.
Likewise, I had a great conversation and follow up emails with Pierre Igot who wrote one of the other blogs talking about the shortcomings of the CS4 installer.
Pierre is a true advocate of great customer experiences and will also be a “lighthouse” customer providing early feedback to make sure we are on track to improve the workflow and polish of the user experience.
I encourage anyone else with the same passion for seeing improvement in the Creative Suite installation experience to get in touch with me directly to discuss your concerns and potentially participate in our pre-release program so you can see the progress being made and provide feedback directly to the Installer team.
My Engineering Manager for the CS4 Installer, Eric Wilde, has provided a guest blog post (below) to respond to some of the specific issues, provide some detail on the Installer design decisions raised here, and to briefly discuss some of the priorities for CS5.
I certainly do appreciate the frank and lively discussion that is taking place here which shows there is passion shared by many for delivering a quality customer experience.
Thanks,
Barry
—
Sr. Director Engineering and Program Mgmt.
Creative Suite Business Unit
Adobe Systems, Inc.
bhills@adobe.com
Adobe uses numerous install technologies, each with their own pros and cons. The install technology chosen for any given product is based on the install needs of the project. For simple products like Lightroom we can use MSI or InstallShield in a pretty straightforward fashion. The platforms’ install technology can satisfy the needs for many simpler products. When a product comes along that is as complex as the Creative Suite, we begin to run into limitations in the platforms’ install technology.
The Creative Suite has a particular challenge in that it includes a couple of layers of products. There is the Creative Suite installer itself, which includes many point products. Each point product must be installable both as a component of the Creative Suite and as a standalone installer for when the user purchases just a point product. In addition, there are extra layers of shared technology across the products that must be package managed accurately to make sure the uninstall of any one product does not break the other products remaining on the system.
These multiple layers of package management are not adequately supported by platform install technology for both Mac and Windows. Add to this the sheer size and scope of the Creative Suite and we run into scalability limitations for the package management that is available within platform install technology.
One could argue that Adobe should make simpler products that don’t require such complex package management. While such an approach is appealing, it would also cripple some of the features which make Adobe’s products so compelling. This is particularly true for features that function across the various products within the Creative Suite.
There are a handful of other reasons why Adobe chooses to implement its own install technology. Some of these reasons are important for our users, such as a reinstall workflow on the Mac. Others are more about efficiencies in creating our installers, such as being able to easily produce installers for multiple platforms without having to work around the quirks of multiple installer technologies.
While we realize that our install technology is not perfect, we have been doing our best to make it satisfy the most important needs of our customers. In CS4 we focused on making the installer robust so that even though it was long and sometimes painful to install the Creative Suite, the install most often succeeded. As Barry mentioned, customer service calls for installation-related issues are down by more than half compared to CS3, so we feel we have indeed addressed some of the most egregious install problems. We do recognize the troubles felt in enterprise environments and are diligently working to address those problems as quickly as we can.
Eric Wilde
—
Engineering Manager
Creative Suite Business Unit
Adobe Systems, Inc.
ewilde@adobe.com
I must admit that part of my criticism for the installer is just the UI. I was installing the Master Suite. On my Mac OS X, I have a 1920×1200 screen (and that is actually not _that_ large). The installer dialog is just ridiculously small for such an extensive package. I had to do far too much scrolling up and down to deselect some of the components, and I was disappointed that the installer dialog was not resizable. I would have made it three times as tall for me so I would need less scrolling (and therefore less chance to omit something important). Also, I was disappointed not to find a simple “Select all” and “Deselect all” option. For example, while installing the Master Collection, I actually would have preferred to deselect everything and then just select the apps I specifically wanted to install.
The installer UI kind of looks like it was hacked together without any designer involved, and definitely does not match up to the high UI standards that I’m used to from Adobe.
It’s great to hear Barry’s sentiments – it makes me feel really optimistic about CS5!
Something that I would personally love to see in the CS5 installers would be to have the installers automatically check to see whether any updates have been released. On those occasions that I do not upgrade immediately, I always check for updates as soon as the installation process has finished – it would be fantastic not to have to do that : )
“We do recognize the troubles felt in enterprise environments and are diligently working to address those problems as quickly as we can.”
That’s music to my ears.
Thanks Eric, Barry & John 🙂
Very interesting. I suppose I’m one of the lucky ones that hasn’t had any installer problems. My cursor issues are still driving me nuts though. See: http://www.vimeo.com/2174426
In any case, the two responses above are an interesting study in and of themselves. They pretty much mirror, though in a more polished form, customer service calls.
The first, from Barry, is typical of what happens when you escalate to a level of someone who can actually get things done. It says all the right things as upper management is prone to do.
The second, from Eric, is more typical of the “checklist” tech support is so chained to, and sounds more like a set of excuses rather than anything productive. Basically, it comes across (to me) as a “Yes, but . . .” and the typical, “we’re working on it. . .”
I’m sure it has more to do with communication style than anything else, but if I were a disgruntled customer, Barry’s response would at least calm me a bit, while Eric’s would send me through the roof and up the chain until I reached Barry.
I really appreciate the openness. I, for one, have really noticed an improvement with CS4 installations, although non-standard installers still make me cringe.
As far as multi-install environments, CS3 actually seemed to be a step backwards over CS2 for me when it comes to silent installs from the command line. Pretty much every CS3 app installed this way eventually needed the serial number manually entered, even though it had been part of the install script (and was tested after install). I haven’t had the opportunity to test this with CS4 as our enterprise hasn’t upgraded to CS4 yet.
Also, can you *please* not install a *full version* of Opera? Why not just use WebKit like everyone else does?
[We will. The use of Opera predates the widespread availability & robustness of WebKit, and we didn’t have time this cycle to swap one for the other. –J.]
I have an idea: Why don’t you make improvements to the new CS4 installer instead of announcing relief for CS5?
[Didn’t we just say that the installer is greatly improved in CS4? It’s not perfect, and it’s not especially aesthetically pleasing, but it’s much more robust than the Adobe-Macromedia chimera produced for CS3. –J.]
I don’t like the idea of spending another 1000 Euros on a bugfix to a problem that I reported when CS1 came out.
Make the fix an update. I predict the customers won’t hate you for that.
Barry Writes:
How are CS4 vs. CS3 sales? The 51% figure isn’t particularly meaningful unless it is normalized with some metric which may approximate total installs.
Without reading the post, the installer shouldn’t eat 100% of available CPU time. Something is seriously wrong with it.
I understand your reasons for going down the route you did – but rather than continuing to go down that route, I’d like to encourage you to work with the companies (well, at least Apple) to help make their installer technologies work for deployment of your product using industry-standard tools. Apple made significant strides with the Installer in Leopard versus Tiger – certainly it could be accomplished if you work with them (I know Apple knows of the pains of Adobe CS deployment, as it’s brought up year after year after year at WWDC)…
I say this with conviction because I will be onsite next week at a large customer rolling out CS4, and a large chunk of my time will be spent taking your installers and repackaging them as Apple installers for deployment using tools like ARD and/or JAMF’s Casper. Maybe I should be grateful for the consulting opportunities, but I’d really rather that you do this “right” and not require me to spend hour/days reinventing the wheel here (and at other customers)…
*sigh*
Quick question: when you say “51% fewer Technical Support Installer related calls ” is that matched to the number of owners? That is, if there were 75% fewer owners then 51% fewer calls would actually be an increase!
[It’s comparing apples to apples–a comparable number of CS4 users vs. CS3 users. I can’t say anything more specifically about CS4 sales, as that kind of info is regulated by financial disclosure rules. –J.]
Second, it all sounds great–but it also sounded great when I heard a similar message after CS3 was released. In fact, you could just replace every instance of “cs5” with “cs4” and the message would be the same. I can even write the response to the CS5 installer now–just put “cs6” in all those places.
I can see it’s a huge engineering task… but still. This idea that the apps are so huge and complex as a positive just doesn’t wash. 1.9 gigs for Acrobat… what else do you need to say?
[Out of curiosity, where are you getting that figure? I just did a Get Info on my Acrobat 9 Pro Mac installation (which should be just about the biggest there is) and saw 1.11GB. That’s big, no question, but it’s not 1.9GB. –J.]
Take MS Office. It’s pretty darn complex… maybe less than CS–but still, the installer works.
Having said all this–I found the CS4 installer was pretty good. I don’t care so much that it takes a long time–my concern is more to do with how you all apparently haven’t or can’t account for every use case. For example, I uninstalled Dreamweaver CS3 and now Dreamweaver 8 doesn’t work! Who knows where those disks are–I was stuck until I put CS4 on. I’m sorry–but it’s so far from a solid platform you need to start over or something. Maybe attempt less ambitious features.
Finally, saying you’re thinking of some AIR monitor doesn’t exactly exude a lot of confidence if AMP is anything to compare to. I know I’m just pulling out random stuff here, but really… there’s a problem that can be fixed and I think the solution is simplicity–not more complexity.
[Yes, things do need to be simplified. We’ve been throwing things overboard from Photoshop and will continue to work to do so (as everything old & new that we keep has to be rewritten for Cocoa). It’s a painful process, though, as we’re loathe to break anyone’s workflow. But whatever: it’s to make tough decisions that they pay us the mid-sized bucks. –J.]
This isn’t openness, it’s defensiveness and a plea to take things to email where they can’t be seen. We all want answers to Bynkii’s complaints, not a message that he’s been told them.
[I guess I’m missing the defensiveness you’re hearing. Tone doesn’t always come across correctly in written communication, so let me emphasize that I’m hearing a positive, constructive message from Barry, Eric, and others involved with the installers. –J.]
As for Installer.app not being up to the job — Apple uses it to install OS X itself, which is degrees more complicated than CS. And MS Office equally relies upon shared components and ability to install point apps, and it didn’t even need an installer until recently!
[I have no expertise with which to comment on the relative merits of various installer technologies, so I’ll leave that to others. –J.]
I just want to install InDesign CS4 (I do not own the whole Suite) without all the other baggage. I don’t use Bridge and have no idea what that Extension Manager business is about, but one or the other (I forget which) cannot be deselected. Forgive me for not being specific as I don’t really want to install it again to see what it is I don’t want to install 🙂
You asked (regarding Acrobat’s slim system requirements): “Out of curiosity, where are you getting that figure?”
Made it up… no, really, just read the system requirements from Acrobat’s own docs:
http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobatproextended/pdfs/acrobatproext_datasheet.pdf
Actually, that doc says 2.35 gigs.
The default install of Windows XP is less than that.
[The stated requirements are always higher than the install footprint, in order to ensure that there’s enough empty space for temp files, etc. –J.]
Sorry, I am just not buying the technical complexity argument. If Apple can install the Final Cut suite using an .mpkg, then there’s no reason that you can’t do the same with Creative Suite.
And for the love of god, please please please get rid of Adobe Updater. Sometimes I wonder if it’s some sort of mind game when it tries to update itself. Please just use sparkle like every other decent app.
Hi Allan-
This is not an effort to ‘take things to email’. I reiterated a couple of times in my earlier message to email me your contact info and I will call you directly. (send to bhills@adobe.com)
John W is coming to visit us in a couple of weeks and we will be discussing issues/workflows and plans for CS5. He hasn’t been given any ‘answers’ yet and I’ll leave it to him to describe after our meeting whether he is optimistic about changes going forward.
Thanks,
Barry
While the Adobe Installer does leave plenty to be desired, I’m feeling a little ripped off having forked out for CS3 when it came out less than a year ago.
[It *did not* come out less than a year ago. There were a full 18 months between CS3 shipping (Apr. 15, 2007) and CS4 shipping (Oct. 15, 2008). –J.]
Rather than fixing bugs in point-updates, they are charging for a full release of CS4.
Now Barry’s talking about things being better in CS5 — so I guess there’s no real impetus for Adobe to ever fix anything. They can just keep charging everyone for new releases! And what “if” CS5 has other bugs? Can we just buy CS6?
I’m seriously discouraged from investing in another Adobe release by their “Let The User Pay” attitude, and will only do so if/when my company requires it.
My only pet peeve with the Adobe installers is during activation. I have to wait for the Internet access to time out before I can tell it about our proxy. I would prefer to have some way to specify proxy settings upfront.
Relating to some of the comments above, I prefer that the installer take as much CPU time as it needs, even if that is 100%. If it is holding back, the install will only take longer.
Please don’t install updates during first installation. I prefer to make sure the application runs at least once before I risk screwing up the installation applying updates. I can look for updates and download them during the install process.
One other comment about updates, although a bit off-topic for installers : Please work with Apple and Microsoft to have updates offered via the operating system update technology rather than your own Updater.
Thanks for listening,
Chasd.
RE: Barry Hills
“My Engineering Manager for the CS4 Installer, Eric Wilde…”
It ALWAYS puts me off when a manager refers to another person on their team using the word “my”. I don’t care if the person is a direct report or not, they aren’t property, and you aren’t the center of the universe. It’s our or the team’s. Saying “my” makes you sound like a egotist in an ivory tower.
It probably irks the people on your team, too.
I’m happy to hear the other things you’re saying, but the usage of “my” is one of my pet peeves. Ugh…
Three simple requests:
1. Don’t make Mac users open a file called Setup to install software. Ever.
2. Don’t install things I didn’t ask for. I don’t want Adobe Premiere, and I don’t want its folder placed in /Applications just so you could create its Plug-ins folder within.
3. Don’t bounce THREE Installer icons in the Dock during this process.
I understand that there are probably rational reasons for these 3 behaviors (1. Cross-platform consistency? 2. Easy cross-app plug-in sharing? 3. Gremlins?) but they are remarkably unprofessional all the same. They may not result in tech support calls – what would one call for, to say the Installer is acting junky? – but they are irksome.
First off, I’m assuming this is related to individual installs and not enterprise.
If there were any Project management over CS3, it failed at naming conventions, directory structure in the installs and a few other items like where files were located. It differed from one app to another. It took me a week to debug the Silent Install for CS3. I was finally able to get it to work 100% on clean machines.
I would have also expected a PKG or MPKG for the enterprise users so we can deploy from Apple Remote Desktop and not have to create our own custom packages.
CS4 Silent Install offers no feedback to ARD like CS3 did so we have no way of knowing it completed successfully.
Also, when I suppress Updates in CS3, initially they ARE suppressed but the updaters turn it back on. Acrobat updates cannot be suppressed either. CS4 appears to allow me to suppress updates but it’s a pretend suppression.
Acrobat updates for CS3 could not be run silently…and…when run manually from a users desktop, it couldn’t FIND the application I wanted to update although it DID open the Acrobat directory containing the application. That was just icing on our cake…not only could it not be run silently, it was blind.
…you’d think they could take a bit of time and use the proper tools to create packages for the Enterprise to be able to deploy easily.
There should be a law also preventing one from using the term Uber unless it IS Uber.
CS5 is too far away…the installers can be fixed at least for the Enterprise folkes forced to use what we were provided.
Hi Phillip-
I understand your point on the “My Eng Mgr” vs “The Eng Mgr”.
Eric and I have known each other for 11 years and have a great working relationship. I doubt he will take offense, but duly noted.
Thanks,
Barry
I needed Reader 9.0 to fill in a PDF form for an insurance company. As everybody but Adobe knows, Apple’s built-in PDF rendering is signficantly better than Reader. It’s faster and reading a PDF in a browser isn’t a chrome-laden painful experience. Reader is just unpleasant for OS X users. When done with the form, how do I remove this virus-like Reader install, the worm-like Adobe Updater, etc.? There’s no uninstaller. There’s no KB article on adobe.com explaining it. I have to go spelunking. FAIL.
Provide clear uninstallers. Pare down to install less. Photoshop is just a paint program. It shouldn’t feel like an OS to install and maintain. An application should be one icon that only requires a drag install. You don’t need “Adobe Help Viewer” or “Adobe Updater.” Use simpler solutions like the OS ones or build them into the apps like Sparkle. Migrating to a new box shouldn’t be a major DRM hassle yet it is. Simple app installs shouldn’ virally drag along all your other “corporate initiatives” like AIR, Reader, etc. Remember that you are a guest on my box; it is not yours to do with as you please.
Mac software does not require an installer. Getting rid of the installer is simultaneously the easiest and most complete solution to the problem.
[I have great fondness and respect for Panic products, but I suppose the Final Cut Studio team would be surprised to learn that real Mac software doesn’t require an installer. –J.]
The Adobe CS installer on Mac OS X is painful, but what irritates me the most is when Adobe Update launches along with a CS app, say Photoshop, and then tells me to quit said app so that it can update Acrobat or some other piece of software. That aggravates me to no end. I launched Photoshop to get work done. Why is it always in my face telling me to quit at that instant so that it can update some other piece of software?
[You may be pleased to learn that, by default, the updater no longer prompts you to download/install updates that aren’t deemed critical (e.g. security patches). The trade-off is that you need to choose Help->Updates from within an Adobe app in order to see/download/install updates. It’s a more manual process, but it greatly reduces (if not eliminates) the “nagware” factor present in previous releases. –J.]
Good evening Barry
I stumbled across your CS4 installer blog and found it very interesting.
I work in a municipal government level corporation with a dedicated mac/pc design team that upgrades their systems and software fairly regularly with a 4 year timeframe. Going into 2009 I will be responsible to plan, RFQ, order and rollout 50+ very high end macs that must run properly on first client bootup…no excuses for downtime.
We have recently purchased a few copies of CS3 Design Pro and CS3/CS4 full blast (including the kitchen sink…) Suites and I am very worried that as each suite comes out, my opportunity to service my diverse client groups becomes more difficult.
We use Apple Remote Desktop to deliver many of the applications and in most cases we try to capture specific custom installations (based on user roles such as photographer, vdeographer or page designer) using a newer tool called “LANRev Installease”. This tool captures the standard before/after snapshots perfectly in most cases.
With the captures in Apple PKG format, ARD works wonderfully. Automatic uninstallers can also be created. Damaged installations, user mishaps can be repushed, preactivated and ready to go with no worries of having to physically be present at the site to ensure the 1+ hour install finishes properly.
Another advantage is that our software library is fully controlled, protected for theft or misuse, and serial numbers are never required. With the original media locked away we prevent unuthorized installations. I package updates and push them regularly to the diverse groups to ensure users do not have issues either.
Since CS3, the captures fail every time. I must now visit multiple remote locations to upgrade or install CS3/CS4 suites which is terribly inefficient for a one man support team.
I have read the automation methods osted at Adobe.com but these do not ease the installation woes I experience. I have spoken to others in the IT industry who are as frustrated as I am. Many IT support teams truly want our clients to have the best service levels, instant installations remotely and it appears that Adobe do not seem to worry about the larger organizations and the support tools they use.
Please do not misunderstnd me… these applications are simply the cat’s meow for creative staff and we will do what is necessary to keep them running and happy. But we are frustrated.
Just my thoughts.
Have a good day.
Passwords to install simple applications rile me up. If you have shared components, give the user the option to install them in ~/Library instead of /Library
Photoshop et. al. need to get over themselves as applications. They do not need custom installers. They don’t even need mpkg installers (nor does FCS, btw.)
Drag-and-drop installs on OSX are the future. Get over yourselves and package correctly.
I have a new rule. Simple software gets money preferentially, even if it can’t do what I want exactly. I’ll make do. Photoshop does too much these days anyway, when all I want is a good pixel editor with tablet support and layers. Cheaper alternatives exist (with drag-drop installation!)
Further, I actively suppress (negative reviews, etc) applications that require passwords to install. Applications that need admin passwords tend to contain viruses and whatnot (i dare you to install a video-poker game that asks for your admin password before installing.)
I am now extending this policy to the big vendors like adobe, because they have proven they are not above rootkits and the like to keep their paying customers from doing anything untoward (on purpose or not)
My admin password is for installing system updates, and for installing drivers for new hardware.
Applications go in ~/Applications and Shared components go in ~/Library. QED.
anything else is a joke. Adobe’s installer is suchlike.
I am both encouraged and discouraged by these two letters, mainly en- by the first, and dis- by the second.
First off, some retorts:
1) Installation software is a necessary evil with only a single pro: at the end, the software is installed. This is exactly why Apple developed the drag-n-drop install. Everything which prevents the software from being installed seamlessly and instantaneously is a con.
2) There is a lot of complicated software out there, not just Adobe’s, and almost none of it requires the contortions that Adobe requires (while still giving so little flexibility).
3) Either 1.1GB or 1.9GB for Adobe Acobat Reader is *at least* an order of magnitude too much; how large is the PDF reading component of Apple’s Preview? Keep in mind that Preview isn’t missing any features for typical usage, so no answers about 3D components and other junk that Reader forces on users who don’t know it is there, and don’t need.
4) I’ll skip the comment about Adobe’s product being compelling. IMO if there were serious alternatives to many of Adobe’s products, Adobe would go out of business. Photoshop is my favorite app to hate, yet need.
5) The comment about 50% less complaints in CS4 makes it sound like dearadobe.com never happened. A revolution is needed here, not an evolution. I understand that this is not possible with limited resources, but please talk as if this is the case, and simply drop the denials. Any Adobe exec who thinks Adobe’s installers just need a little tweaking should install the entire CS4 on his personal computer and then see what he thinks. Make him/her do an update as well.
These and other comments are incredibly beside the point. The point is that the installation procedure of the CS series of products, is simply the worst that I have ever encountered by a Mac, by a massive margin, which has been documented in public in many places, on blogs, in reviews, and so on. As so many others say, let *me* choose what to install. I don’t want web components, I don’t want Bridge or Reader, I don’t want shared libraries or Folders in my Applications folder, I don’t want sample art, I don’t in fact want anything, except Photoshop.app in my Applications folder.
In the end, the only acceptable outcome is an installation procedure which looks and feels like something Apple might do for one of their complicated) products (like the entire XCode suite, and takes not much longer to install than it takes to copy raw data off a similar number of DVDs.
Period.
Oh, and please pass the following comment to the Adobe Europe pricing team: until you stop charging 2-3 times more for Photoshop in Europe than in the States, I will continue to buy in the States, not Europe. Adding VAT and a small handling/currency fee is okay.
P.S. Oh, the irony in having multiple server-side errors while trying to submit this entry. It keeps deleting my username and email, and once didn’t even display the entry field for “photoshop”, while complaining that I hadn’t filled it in.
I forgot one thing:
I use case-sensitive HFS+ partitions by preference. Please sort out your problem instead of making it mine.
Apart from desiring a pkg installer like other posters, my ongoing problem is with the Adobe Updater. It doesn’t work through our http proxy if we use the proxy.pac file. It will work if the proxy is changed to the more direct route but that’s not really helpful when the pac is needed for other things at the site.
I’ve been using Photoshop since before it was an Adobe product. And I have used virtually every single Adobe/Mac app over the last two decades professionally and advised countless companies and clients to do so as well. Until the CS mentality of assuming that a user must essentially install and manage a second OS on top of the one they are already using.
CS has gotten completely out of hand in complexity and scope. This will not change until and unless Adobe begins to rethink its fundamental approach to application design. The inanity of the installation issues is a small symptom, certainly not the sole cause of frustration people like me have with the Adobe bloat. We are looking at alternatives to Adobe products at every turn, I’m sad to say after nearly two decades of usage.
Installation is design. So the process should be designed by a designer from the very start. And an experienced designer will tell you that you really shouldn’t be focusing on how to make installing an obscene number of dependent files easier, but question the very notion of creating such bloat to begin with. I know, for Adobe, there are financial imperatives for selling complexity but that turns out to be not long-lasting. The ability to manage this architecture seems to be getting away from you.
I submitted rdar://problem/6391480 in Apple’s bugtracker system, so hopefully someone from Apple will hammer on this as well.
The quality of your installer is highly suspect when your scripts assume that the user’s home folder will be in /Users. This is _not_ a valid assumption on OS X or any UNIX-y OS.
Thanks to John and Adobe for your openness on this issue. It is great to see a company the size of Adobe engaging in dialogue like this where the temptation must surely be to shut up shop and pretend everything is perfect in the latest release, particularly given Adobe’s market dominance in this area.
By not using the standard Mac OS X installer format you have made the Creative Suite applications nearly impossible to deploy in any sort of manageable manner for education and enterprise environments. This has caused countless hours of additional and tedious work around the world just to deploy your applications. Considering how you aggressively market to these customers I cannot believe the backlash from them has not yet caused a change.
Microsoft has finally switched to .pkg, please do the same. I am not sure what limitations you believe exist in the PackageMaker format but considering that Mac OS X can be installed with it, it allows for the ability to turn on and off options, and it can gracefully handle dependencies, I don’t see where the problem is.
A proprietary installation solution will never be deployable via Apple Remote Desktop and will most likely never be possible to do from the command line. Proprietary solutions are also incompatible with Apple’s NetInstall and countless third party system imaging utilities. This is completely unacceptable in 2008. Mac OS X has been on the market for 7.5 years.
There is now a third party which has created specific functionality to deal with the ineptitude of the CS3 install process. JAMF Software’s Composer, part of the Casper Suite, includes a button in the toolbar that is specifically designed to make Adobe CS3 packages. The fact that someone else is profiting off of problems caused by Adobe software is not a good thing.
If using PackageMaker is really so hard I suggest you contact Apple Developer Relations. I have no doubt they will be happy to assist one of their largest developers with such a fundamental OS X development technology.
First thanks for explaining the installer issues clearly.
Do these same explanations cover the installation process for Flash Player 10? I love the new feature set but hesitate to deploy the newest version of Flash because the install process is so intrusive. I seem to remember the “express install” process being smoother in the past.
Is there any chance the Flash player installer will be updated before CS5?
If anything, it sure feels like Mac users are getting second class treatment here, starting with the Installer—it really seems like a bad port from Windows with a clunky Flash interface. I don’t need to see custom progress bars… just give me a fast, reliable way to install the software I need.
It’s really funny to see “the install most often succeeded” written here. I have never had a problem with Apple’s pkg installers and I’m sure they can be customized by Adobe as needed—as stated earlier, Apple Logic Studio and Final Cut products are arguably as complex as Adobe’s and Apple manages to install those products just fine, not to mention it’s used to install Mac OS X itself. I don’t know of many Mac applications that don’t use Apple’s installer.
Please, Adobe, before you reinvent the wheel (again), consider Apple’s installer. You might actually like it.
I’ll never be able to get back all the time I wasted–not just downloading the CS3 suite 3 times before the 3rd download finally installed properly, but then having constant license issues shut down each application over and over, and having to spend hours and hours of time on the phone with tech people who I was certain I knew more about the product than they did. Up until about a week or two ago my Adobe Acrobat Pro was still giving me a “product not activated” error and I was having to repair the installation at least once a week–a process that took at least a half hour, not including the reboot time.
Needless to say I doubt I’ll be upgrading because you’ve wasted enough of my time.
I’m sitting here, an IT guy, late at work shaking my head. I’ve been working on a script using Adobe’s documentation because they refuse to create .pkg installers and make it practically impossible to even re-package their software for use with our deployment system.
After two days work I’m looking at a “silent” install that is now hung because the Setup application wants to connect to the Internet through our proxy server, which it can’t do without authentication.
Adobe, you’re literally forcing me to choose between manually touching every computer in our organization that needs CS4 or not installing it at all.
I’ve heard several claims that Apple’s installer limits your ability to control the install process. Frankly, I don’t care. Make it work.
I need installers that can be deployed to multiple machines using standards that already exist. And I need updaters that do the same thing.
“Adobe” has become a curse word in our department. Their installers are an IT management nightmare.
Add another tally for one who is completely frustrated with Adobe installers ever since CS hit the shelves.
Installing Adobe software on Mac OS X is a complete and utter FAIL.
After CS was released, I stopped upgrading when colleagues shared with me their traumatic experiences with installing CS2, CS3 and CS4.
CS5 needs to at least use the Apple Installer and dump the Adobe Updater before I will consider purchasing it.
I have to agree, the install process for PS6 was fairly simple, but as soon as the Suites got released, the install process became a nightmare, so much so that I try to stay from adobe applications except for when it can’t be avoided.
Thanks to both Barry and Eric for taking the time to respond, as well as to John for providing a great blog platform.
For my part, I would agree that the CS4 installer is an improvement over the CS3 installer which was painfully slow.
I would really love to see some explanatory text outlining the non-point product component function in the suite when selecting the various components in the new CS5 installer. I feel this would allow the end user to make a moderately informed decision on whether or not to install the component (instead of “I don’t think I need that part” or “I should probably install that just in case” scenario that is common with the current CS4 installer).
Another nice touch might be to point users to a ‘before installing’ help file (either on Adobe’s web site or included in a folder) which could outline the functions of each non-point product component and indicate what the functionality differences would be with and without the component installed.
For instance, how would not installing Bridge or Extension Manager affect the overall experience of a given suite install? I apologize if this is already available and I missed something.
Thanks again for the hard work of the Adobe team.
I think it’s great, and it speaks volumes about Adobe and you guys slaving away there that you take the discussions on something like installers so seriously. There will always be something for us to complain about, but the fact you are actually making an effort to not only fix it, but even explain why you make the choices you do, well it makes me a lot more forgiving when something ticks me off. You admit when you make mistakes. Thanks guys. Nice to see you’re in touch with your community.
I’m not writing to complain about the installer, but to ask one question by way of an observation:
Your products have become much more complex over the past five years, and are released on a merciless schedule that seems geared toward revenue enhancement (tactical) rather than customer delight (strategic).
Has Adobe considered slowing down the development schedule for Creative Suite products and going to a two-track, non-compromised development strategy that means the best products possible for Windows and Mac users?
Seriously – your products used to be a joy when they were powerful and simple. Over the past several years, I’m certain your products have grown more powerful, but they are far more difficult to manage than before.
Man, after having direct experience with installers for two releases of our product, I knew I just wanted to write code.
Installers are /hard/. Catching all those corner-cases and one-off exceptions and weird environmental issues is a challenge. Authoring a robust, user-friendly and understandable installer process is one of the greatest challenges I’ve ever faced.
That being said, installer tech needs the same attention to detail and rigour as any good software shop gives to the applications. I’m glad Adobe has decided to champion this aspect of their apps.
Since my name came up…literally…Let me say that my dealings with Barry have been good. he’s been honest, he listens, and that’s really good to see.
however, good intentions are sadly, not enough in this case. So I, and a LOT of other people, (dear lord, let’s not ever think that this is somehow all just my doing, or that I think it is. I’m perhaps…less shy and more colorful than most), have been applying pressure to Adobe, and specifically Barry’s team to get this fixed. To be honest, when it’s fixed, then we’ll be happy, but not until.
I get that for a lot of people, the issues are non-existent. But, making the install process less complicated, and making the installed software setup less complicated is not only good for us, (IT), but it’s good for everyone.
It’s good for all users, because it means that it won’t take 90 minutes to install CS on a 17″ MacBook Pro. Simpler install setups mean faster installs. That’s good.
It means that you won’t have to quit n programs because you’re updating a browser plugin.
Simpler install setups break less.
Simpler install setups mean you don’t need python and complicated uninstall scripts because everything is logically and clearly named, so that you can just toss a few folders if you want to do it manually. You can still have an uninstall script, but that gets to be simpler too.
They mean that you can move an application folder and not have to “repair” the install, or worry that the updater won’t know you have that application, and you’ll miss a security update.
We all have various selfish reasons for wanting this problem to be fixed and to truly go away, but in the end, everyone will benefit from this.
I’m more than a little disappointed that Barry didn’t put in much effort to understand the “platform installer” for the Mac. I honestly don’t know much about MSI, so I won’t comment there, but Mac OS X’s Installer does, actually, correctly layer packages. Each “point” installer can certainly depend on several common packages and Mac OS X’s Installer will correctly skip them if they’re already installed, or upgrade them if needed. (In fact, one can even specify that updates be downloaded from the web if needed.)
Also, I’m surprised that the claim is made that the installer is cross-platform. An installer is anything but cross-platform. An installer that works on a given platform correctly can’t possibley be expected to do the right thing on another platform that, for example, has no concept of loadable bundles, application packages, or (on the other hand) a Start Menu. There’s a whole lot more to an installer than copying files (as is claimed in order to justify the monstrosity that is here defended).
I understand the need to pick your battles. Microsoft took almost a decade to move Office into .pkg files, but it finally did. The response offered here seems to indicate that no attempt will be made to make the installer work correctly, but rather that it is just an exercise in using internal technology instead of embracing a native experience.
I’d like to know more about the Adobe Reader 9 installer for OS X, “powered by inosso.”
There’s nothing wrong with custom compression technologies if the app is complex enough, as argured in the post and i agree with that.
But then why Adobe needed to use this hybrid system of Apple’s installer + some extra proprietary thing?
It just complicates the matter, and the usual automation which can be done for .pkg is impossible with inosso “powered” version.
I’m just curious why Adobe chose this path.
Eric,
I found that for the Flash 10 for Intel install, if you crack open the installer and yank the preflight script, it suddenly works really well for remote installs, because it stops caring if you’re running a web browser.
I’m one that also spent a week attempting to get CS3 silent installed without success.
My first thought is that most people just want an automated install that choses which of the sub-apps to install & where to install them and how to put in a valid registration key all 100% silent & automatic.
To me this is best accomplished by a “watch me” manual install and the install generates the response file.
On top of that – program prefrences should be seperate.
setup.exe
Just a thought.
While the installer may suck objectively, claiming that Apple’s PDF renderer–which is perpetually stuck somewhere in the mid-90s–is “better” than Reader is a bit too subjective an opinion to be a relevant criticism here. If all you ever need to do is fill out an insurance form, then sure, whatever launches fastest is bound to seem more attractive, and Adobe should definitely invest some time into making that particular experience less painful given the amount of PDF pimping they do. However it is important to recognize that there are people who use these silly little “paint” tools professionally–the entire suite’s primary audience for example–and for them Preview is woefully inadequate at pretty much everything. Try getting it to render a complex gradient mesh with transparency and then see how freely those tired little “FAIL” memes flow.
Reader may very well be bloated beyond all reason, but I’ll still take a correct rendering over a quick one any day. Whatever your take on the issue, it’s not really an installer problem.
I want to blow the whistle on the complexity thing as well. I was able to successfully repackage CS3 into an Apple Package and push it with ARD. While I will admit I had problems, (particularly with Reader 8, at the time) It worked. Most of the problems centered around the OTHER screwy things Adobe as a company and Mac-Software-vendor do, like ship an Intel and a PowerPC version of an app, instead of a UNIVERSAL version like every other Mac software house under the sun.
You can’t tell me that adding a PDF Printer (lpadmin) and copying a batch of files (that is needlessly complex, as John W. has pointed out multiple times) is too much for the integrated installer. I’ve seen and proven otherwise.
You have common frameworks, that’s fine. So does Apple. But as Justin pointed about above, Apple is able to Install Final Cut Pro via packages. Hell, they install the entire OS via packages! The OS install merely runs a ridiculously large and sequenced batch of packages!
The Mess you guys made of /Library in CS3 was just unacceptable. The mess you made in /Applications was ridiculous as well, but at least bearable. App’s don’t need their own folders with massive documents installed right with them. They don’t need 3 or 4 counterpart files to be included *outside* the .App. Installing an “Adobe CS5” folder that contains NOTHING but .app files is acceptable. Installing a /Library/Adobe/ folder and having EACH APP intelligently create a ~/Library/Adobe/AppName folder is acceptable. I don’t care what FlexNet is. You install it, 90% of the time it will only be used by YOUR application Suite, it can go in the freaking Adobe folder too. I’ll take the risk that any other app that is OUTSIDE of your suite of tools and uses FlexNet, and if such Apps exist, I will happily let them burn another 100MB of disk space (spitballing here) if it means I can do ridiculously simple cleanups and uninstalls later.
An updater should be able to intelligently handle finding an Application on disk, Apple provides several ways in-code to do this. Writing an Installer plugin (properly) is one thing, but it shouldn’t break ARD deployments.
There are some incredibly complex pieces of software that are both installed by and updated by the Installer program, and Apple has only been improving the process. You cannot claim to be that “special” that you require such a ridiculous process just to put apps on disk and make them work. If your developers and Engineers say otherwise, you need to find some new developers and engineers. I can’t speak to CS4, my current job doesn’t involve software maintenance like the old one did, but the experience of installing CS3 on a Mac was about as close to using Windows and you can get and still be using OS X. It was kludgy, slow, poorly designed, needlessly complex, and just like Windows, with no good reason for any of those problems.
All-
Thanks for the feedback and continued passion to push us to make the Installers better.
There is someone capturing all of the issues listed in this blog (and the emails sent to me directly) and entering them into our bug database so the team will be discussing each item.
Most of the issues I have seen in the 40+ public comments today have to do with the impact of not being able to use the OS based package format or other IT/Enterprise related deployment issues- this is a priority for CS5 and I encourage you to send me email requesting to be part of the pre-release program to make sure we are meeting your needs in this area.
15 people emailed me directly and I want to thank you for the positive comments and constructive input . I still owe a few responses (Ross, Simon, Michael, John) and will get back to you by EOD tomorrow.
If you have read the press releases, it has been a difficult day here at Adobe.
I encourage you to email me (bhills@adobe.com) if you would like to talk directly and/or be part of our pre-release program, especially if you have issues around Enterprise/IT installations.
Thanks again for the candor and frank discussion. It is much appreciated by all of us at Adobe.
-Barry
There is no way around native system packages that use the native system installer. Dot.
We have to install the software on MANY machines in the company. And we have to install updates. And we can NOT use an „updater“ from $COMPANY. This is where packages are made for and what we bought remote administration tools for.
EVERY application can be installed by packages – except, once again, those from Adobe. „To make unique installation experience…“
Please give us photoshop.pkg and a folder where I can put photoshop_update_99_0_1.pkg to install it after downloading it ONCE.
Everything else is PITA.
I’m wondering if Apple’s install procedure is really so efficient, seeing that Appel Engineers choosed to reinstall the whole application (Quicktime-iTunes) instead of patching it.
It’s nice to see people actually stand up and address our complaints about the installer process.
One thing I’d like to say. You mention a drop in support call issues for the installer with the latest version of CS.
I can’t speak to anyone else here, but I’ve stopped raising support calls and complaining because I’ve finally got the message (even if it isn’t the message you want to send) from your installers that you don’t care about putting your customers through great pain, and my time is better spent doing other things than wasting my time making complaints that get ignored.
As I said, that might not be what you want me to think, but it is the message I’m taking away from dealing with a god awful install process that only gets worse when it changes.
All I can say is that it’s not exactly the FIRST install process that has to be updated, because I believe Adobe is (almost) quite right on this. No, it’s the mess afterwards, that is to say (1) the update quirks and (2) the “folder junkyard”.
(1) If I deselect the Adobe PDF plugin for internet in the Acrobat preferences, then it means that I want it to stay deselected. Also, the installer should just work like Apple’s Software Update: just a list with the apps that need an update, a (default checked) checkbox for every app whether you want to install it or not and an Update button. If an administrator’s password is required, then DON’T show that dialog for every single app!
(2) When I specify another install folder in the main installer, then I want Adobe to actually install their software in that given folder. That also means: Adobe Help Viewer, Acrobat.com, Adobe Drive, Adobe Media Encoder and Adobe Media Player. That’s all!
So, thank you, Adobe, for listening, for your openness and for making CS5 the even better Adobe product.
All I can say is that it’s not exactly the FIRST install process that has to be updated, because I believe Adobe is (almost) quite right on this. No, it’s the mess afterwards, that is to say (1) the update quirks and (2) the “folder junkyard”.
(1) If I deselect the Adobe PDF plugin for internet in the Acrobat preferences, then it means that I want it to stay deselected. Also, the installer should just work like Apple’s Software Update: just a list with the apps that need an update, a (default checked) checkbox for every app whether you want to install it or not and an Update button. If an administrator’s password is required, then DON’T show that dialog for every single app!
(2) When I specify another install folder in the main installer, then I want Adobe to actually install their software in that given folder. That also means: Adobe Help Viewer, Acrobat.com, Adobe Drive, Adobe Media Encoder and Adobe Media Player. That’s all!
So, thank you, Adobe, for listening, for your openness and for making CS5 the even better Adobe product.
Besides the issues of Installer, there is also the pain of the Adobe Updater. One of my colleagues (an Adobe Certified Print Expert, and not a novice Mac user) has some kind of issue with Adobe Updater 6 where it keeps on saying it needs to update itself… even though I’ve ensured that he has permissions to write to all of the applicable directories (something which frequently causes the updaters to fail).
The updaters will not run successfully if the account is not an administrative one (which is Apple’s Best Practice for security – make the account people use to browse the Internet and do other things be lower security, yet have a second administrative-level account whose username/password you can use todo the admin-level things you need… except for the Adobe Updater, of course).
There’s no reason that the CS4 updates shouldn’t be Apple installer packages (and not using weird plugins/tech like iNosso, either, which break/don’t work with tools lkie ARD and NetInstall).
As a print service provider I very often see customers struggling with CS issues which are fixed in bug-fix releases which haven’t been applied, either because the updaters don’t work (i.e. CS3) or their IT management has thrown up their hands trying to keep up/make this work. This is the kind of thing that costs customers real money (not to mention loss of employee time/productivity). Adobe needs to get religion here, certainly before CS5…
All I can say is that it’s not exactly the FIRST install process that has to be updated, because I believe Adobe is (almost) quite right on this. No, it’s the mess afterwards, that is to say (1) the update quirks and (2) the “folder junkyard”.
(1) If I deselect the Adobe PDF plugin for internet in the Acrobat preferences, then it means that I want it to stay deselected. Also, the installer should just work like Apple’s Software Update: just a list with the apps that need an update, a (default checked) checkbox for every app whether you want to install it or not and an Update button. If an administrator’s password is required, then DON’T show that dialog for every single app!
(2) When I specify another install folder in the main installer, then I want Adobe to actually install their software in that given folder. That also means: Adobe Help Viewer, Acrobat.com, Adobe Drive, Adobe Media Encoder and Adobe Media Player. That’s all!
So, thank you, Adobe, for listening, for your openness and for making CS5 the even better Adobe product.
Adobe Reader 9 on my Macbook shows a total size of 216.3MB on disk. I think you’re talking about Acrobat *Pro*, which, in version 9 is 1.09GB on my drive.
I’ll agree that 216MB is large for a pseudo-reader, (it’s hardly “just” a reader anymore), but Preview’s 70MB, so neither is tiny.
My biggest beef with Reader, aside from the inane installer, is that it’s SLOW, the PDF plugin is slow-ER and only works with Safari, and it still requires too much work to get Acrobat to not require an administrator password when you start it up.
But Reader really isn’t over a GB in size.
I have two issues with CS3/CS4. If you disable your anti-virus software when installing CS3/CS4, they will install a lot faster since there seems to be 1000s of little files that are installed.
Second issue is when running Dual screen monitors, but running CS4 full screen on just one of them. There seems to be part of the window on the second screen by the edges. I don’t know if this is an ATI drivers issue or with CS4’s new custom windowing.
I understand that CS is complex, but your software isn’t the only complex software in existence. Plenty of complex applications properly use standard installers to do their work, and many of those applications are more complex and more integrated than CS. The CS installer has been bad since CS1 and, in my opinion, it’s only gotten worse. With every new version comes new deployment headaches and no previous problems resolved – at least none of the problems I care about. I don’t care of the installer fails for obscure reasons. I can handle that. What I care about is the fact that there are no good ways to deploy the CS. Every option is painful and proprietary. PLEASE work with other vendors if their packaging tools don’t do what you need. PLEASE use standard packaging tools the way they were intended to be used. PLEASE stop producing such convoluted and backwards installers. Follow the rest of the world. Be a team player. Save me the headache of spending two weeks trying to package your software every time a new version comes out. By producing such a proprietary installer with such poor support for mass deployments you cost my organization time and money; more money, in fact, than what we paid for the product in the first place. This is ridiculous.
I agree with “Don’t install things I didn’t ask for.”
I use (and want to install): Acrobat, DW, Ct, Ai, Ps, Fireworks.
I don’t use and DON’T WANT installed:
Bridge, Version Cue, Device Central. I don’t even know what these are and I don’t care to know.
Let me choose what to install.
I’m sorry, but there really is no excuse in the year 2008 why Adobe cannot use Apple and Microsoft’s standard installer formats. Both PKG and MSI are mature formats at this point, and the documentation and tools to create COMPLEX installers are out there. They are also the standard format for the majority of the deployment tools for Mac OS X and Windows respectively.
As someone who is tired of re-packaging Adobe installers and Adobe updates, please, please listen to us IT folks and get us standard installers. If FLEXnet is the problem, then come up with an alternative- or come out with a separate version for the enterprise.
Are they interested in the fact that the Flash Player 10 installer fails on MacOS X Leopard? Something called DashboardClient hasn’t been accounted for and prevents installation.
The installer itself is acceptable, I don’t really have any criticism of it, although I had a big-time snafu that turned out to have nothing to do with the installer. It is really slow (two DVDs of data is going to be slow no matter what you do), and it might be nice to provide some entertainment while it’s going on…
But I’d like to point out my continuing problems with the Adobe Downloader and Safari/Mac. I have had issues numerous times with purchases on the Adobe Store and as in the past, I could not download the CS4 trial versions unless I switched to Firefox. This situation creates lot of anxiety since you only have one chance to download these fonts and other store purchases, and once the download fails you have to find a human to reset the download for you. The process of downloading a trial version, then purchasing a serial number is a more reliable.
And thank you for NOT resetting my Safari preference to open PDFs with Preview instead of Acrobat 🙂
One more thing… about the Adobe Updater. The moment I am LEAST INTERESTED in installing another Acrobat update is when I launch Photoshop or Dreamweaver. I know most programs do it this way, but there are so many products in the suite that A) the chance of having an update to install is much more frequent and, B) the likelihood that the update has nothing to do with the product I just launched is very high.
Can you make it an option to run the Updater ON LOGIN rather than on a CS product launch? Login is a much more appropriate time.
Thanks!
Yep. Prior to the ranting and foaming, I’d stopped raising the issue, as it had become pretty clear that it was going to be fixed anytime soon. So why keep asking about it?
I would give up ALL other gripes about the CS line if you would just fix Adobe Updater. It DOES NOT WORK. Even if it finds the updates (often times it will download for an hour or two and then fail, saying that the file has changed), it will ask to be authenticated every single time. Why cannot you queue the updates and authenticate ONCE and then install all at ONCE? It kills me.
Hi Bill-
I am checking on the Flash Player/Leopard issue you raised. I have not seen that myself but checking with the team and our support folks.
Thanks,
Barry
Hi Bill-
Update from QE Manager…
“We’ve done hundreds, if not thousands of installs of FP10 on Leopard without incident during testing, between the Suites, the PP and FP10 itself. However, we’ll investigate this.”
Stay tuned or if you have any additional detail please send to me.
Thanks,
Barry
If they need to fix anything, they need to fix the Uninstaller. Occasionally, the Adobe CS needs to be *completely* removed when things break. There is no way to do it. On the Mac you can even still run the applications you just “uninstalled”.
The Adobe Updater is broken most of the time, and it has been for years and years.
The Adobe Updater fails in many ways at different times: it can fail to find the available updates on the server; it can show updates that have already been applied; it can fail to find the product on the disk to update; it can leave you with an incomplete or faulty installation; it can just flat out fail, etc.
Hi Rob-
RE: “I can’t speak to anyone else here, but I’ve stopped raising support calls and complaining because I’ve finally got the message (even if it isn’t the message you want to send) from your installers that you don’t care about putting your customers through great pain, and my time is better spent doing other things than wasting my time making complaints that get ignored.”
The team is listening and I am listening so please keep the issues and comments coming and you will see continued improvements on both Installers and Updating.
Thanks,
Barry
read all the comments and forgot to point to my adobe updater videos:
Original (studio version):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBkKBeVX9js
Special MAX version (live):
http://tinyurl.com/adobeupdater
On the Flash 10 installer…just yank the preflight script out of the package. It then stops checking for running web browsers, and installs. You restart your browser, and it’s all good.
I was using Photoshop Elements 6 for Macintosh (after 3, 4 and 5) and darn if an installer keeps interrupting work and then it never actually installs the thing. I gave up trying to figure out how to get it to not bother me again and bought Aperture.
I am always very excited when big companies solicit honest feedback, because it gives me a chance to jump in with really specific thoughts and suggestions. Ironically enough, I can’t do that now. I haven’t worked with Adobe products in the past few years because my experience in corporate IT supporting a marketing department meant that when I started working on IT consulting, I actively avoided ever recommending Adobe software since it just didn’t seem worth the headache to support. From what I’ve heard, it got worse than I remember. (And that’s even given the fact that my time installing CS3 would have been client billable!)
1st, I think it would be great if Adobe really compiled a detailed explanation of exactly why they wrote their own installers. What *exactly* are the issues you have with standard tools? (No, “Cross-application integration” isn’t a specific answer.) Assume the audience for this document is IT staff and programmers, not creative types. Help people understand the issues that you have so we at least have the ability to be sympathetic. I get the feeling from everything I know that this document doesn’t exist. Whoever approved writing the installers without first demanding this document should be much more careful in the future.
2nd, Everybody working on CS should be aware of the document. It isn’t a list of features that make CS too awesome for normal installers. It’s a list of fuckups that need to be corrected so that using normal installers is trivial.
3rd, specific goals should be set for improving the installation experience. They should be publicly announced a long time prior to release. IOW, they shouldn’t be “hey look, we improved it by X, so we’ll claim that was our goal.” It should be, “We haven’t improved things by our preset criteria yet, so it isn’t done and we need to keep working.” I’d say a user should be able to install just Photoshop in under two minutes from putting in a disc until being ready to start opening the installed program. That’ll require work at many levels – some guys will need to be working on making specific things smaller. (Removing redundancy between two DLL’s, or using a more efficient implementation of a particular function.) Others working on identifying the minimum number of things that are needed to run Photoshop. (Sample pictures and whatnot is not required.) Others working on improving the ease of selecting just a minimal Photoshop install in the installer. (And no, taking three minutes to uncheck boxes to get the file-copying to under two minutes doesn’t mean you’ve done it in two minutes. It means you’ve done it in five.) Meeting those deployability goals will mean people working on the issues at *all* levels of development – it can’t just be saying to the installer team, “Okay, here’s the finished app. Write an installer for it.”
If it wants to shut down my web browser in order to install Photoshop or Premiere, it’s broken. If QA says it isn’t broken, they may need to be replaced. Period. That’s a show stopper “do not release” bug. It is not acceptable.
Also, requiring Adobe Reader or Flash or any other junk is not acceptable.
And, on the subject of Adobe Reader and Flash… If I download the installer, the installer should not download something else to install. Period. I already downloaded the installer. I should be able to burn it onto a CD and use it to install on a machine without Internet access. Any other method is frustrating, counterintuitive, etc. Stop that.
So, IMO, CS5 should not simply have improved deployability. Deployability should be treated as the number one driving feature. All architectural decisions should be based on accommodating that driving feature. Everyone should be thinking about it. Employees should be encouraged and rewarded for everything they can do to improve efforts in that direction. All other features should be subordinate to the driving feature. If somebody says, “Hey, I’ve figured out an amazing new Feature for After Effects that makes animated Trolls dance the lambada while wearing disco jumpsuits,” then the first response should be, “How will it effect the installer? How much will it add to the size? Will the extra checkbox in the installer for the dancing trolls plugin be an annoyance?”
And, in the end, I expect you’ll be glad you did. Every description of the reasons for the installer issues seem inspired by architectural craft which make maintenance and improvements more difficult than they should be.
I know the fact that I haven’t really dealt with CS3 issues much makes my comment carry some reduction in weight. I just hope that the balancing consideration is that the reason I’ve avoided dealing with CS3 issues is by telling my clients not to buy it. This issue is costing Adobe money. Any Adobe employee reading this should remember that the installers are already effecting his paycheck, and average install time got longer between CS3 and CS4, even if tech support calls became less frequent. It hurts Adobe’s reputation, and the problems won’t go away on their own.
Two more things I have thought of since my earlier rant:
Updates should be CUMULATIVE, or at the very least have an option to be. There are few things more annoying that having to install v8.0. Then v8.1. Then v8.2. Then v8.3. I want to just install v8.0 then apply the damned v8.3 patch! I don’t care if the download is 1GB (well ok, that part of it is quite ridiculous, but if i have to download 3 updates at 200+MB each, we’re not losing a whole lot of ground).
The other thing I think a lot of people are missing, or simply aren’t looking for, is the backend design of the Suite is horrible. There’s no Apple-standard Framework bundles being installed. What should be Stand-Alone apps are often buried deep within a file tree, support files are scattered all over, I can remember counting like 70 violations of Apple’s Application Design guidelines (not the Interface Design, that’s a whole ‘nother can of worms) I’m talking the “These files go here, those files go there” Guidelines. If there is ANY reason POSSIBLE for you to justify the over complicated install process it is because some, if not most, of the suite’s backend looks like a really bad Windows-port-gone-wrong.
Key Points:
-Get your engineers to intelligently solve problems (The whole thing of including Opera along with Bridge…just WRONG)
-Follow the guidelines set down from on high (Apple). They are there for a reason, to make YOUR lives as Developers easier, and to make everybody else’s lives as User’s easier. If its too “Slow” or whatever, talk to Apple first before you reinvent the wheel. And if you Insist on reinventing it, do it intelligently using the methods provided.
-Give us Cumulative Updates
-Actually TEST that things can be deployed via ARD seamlessly.
-Stop shipping counter-acting components with the suite that are available freely (Acrobat Pro would install a version of the browser plugin that Reader didn’t like, and vice versa)
-Start Shipping Universal Binaries on EVERYTHING.
-Test that both an Automated and a Manual removal are easy and thorough. If they’re not, then make them so.
I installed the CS4 Master Collection and I do think it’s an improvement over CS3. I remember CS3 being slow and for whatever reason whenever I had to reinstall something I was required to uninstall everything and reinstall everything (and I had CS3 Master Collection so it was a big time waster).
CS4 is better, but it can be improved:
I had CS3 and CS4 installed together for awhile, and last weekend I removed CS3. That seemed to have removed some App Support files required for Photoshop, and I had to reinstall it. The installer also required that I reinstall Bridge CS4 and some extraneous support files and apps along with it. Things are so complex now that doing any kind of install gets hairy if it goes beyond the norm.
The time it takes to install is much improved, and I doubt that this can be improved further given the size of the Master Collection. I do wish the startup time of the installer itself would be faster—I have to wait five minutes just to begin installing.
Adam Twardoch is right, when you are installing the Master Collection one needs to scroll to see the full list of apps.
—
In the end I do think the CS4 team did a decent job of improving the installer experience, and I expect they will improve it further in CS5.
+1 to using the OS Installers.
+12 to FIX Updater.
I have machines that updater works on and machines that it doesn’t. It just hangs without installing the update. If I’m installing Design Standard, I don’t need Device Central or FlashLight. So it is incredibly frustrating that the installs fail on things we don’t use…
Yes, there is too much bloat in the applications. Make each one self-contained. Like an app SHOULD be.
CS4 is my first suite… Such a collection of large programs to install is no small feat. It all went well for me on my macbook pro. Installed from media… not download. Now to find the time to learn all these great tools.
John, Thanks for your advice about the preflight script. I wasn’t expressing concern for myself, instead I was expressing concern as a Flash author who would have customers turned away by a difficult install process.
I’ll hope for a relatively quick fix. In the mean time the install process for Silverlight, while imperfect, is worlds better than the Flash 10 player installation.
George, I recall (on this page who left a response) has a point. I also used Photoshop since Photoshop 6 and I’m not happy with the changes, mostly after CS2. Ever since I installed CS2, my computer was very slow, not to mention the few payloads added on and the slow installation. Then I had the guts to install CS4 and there were even more payloads and it took even LONGER to install. I am awfully sorry Adobe but if I had a choice not to use Photoshop, it’s a good program but all the addons, updaters, stuffy-ness, annoyances HAS to go away. I may be wrong about this, but I am also annoyed about how one Adobe product (which I am not sure which; either AI or PS) installed fonts… MANY MANY fonts. Although I already unchecked installation of fonts on PS, I suspected it was AI. If this isn’t a problem, before CS4, CS3 also required the installation of many MANY fonts and didn’t give you a choice not to choose it.
I have Adobe folders everywhere and the Adobe folders were the ones that take up MOST of my hard drive space and I’m not even joking. It’s an awful shame because PS7 was my favorite Photoshop but everwhere I downloaded gradients, brushes, swatches, shapes from, no place supports PS7. I think people wish they could downgrade Adobe products than upgrade.
Also no offense but does Adobe honestly think people buy Photoshop? My friend told me that if she doesn’t update Adobe Flash every year, it’s basically broken. She COULD BE wrong, but if that’s true, I think that’s just a forced update. The last few Photoshops I got, I borrowed from friends who do various designing. Image THEM having to buy the same product (switching a few icons and adding a few new features) every year and you’re stuck with a bloated product? What exactly is Adobe Bridge, Adobe Toolkit (or whatever) Adobe Fonts, Adobe this, Adobe that? What happened to just Photoshop or just Illustrator or just Flash? What happened to the thumbnail view? Now all of the sudden we HAVE to use Bridge to view thumbnails?
And about the updater, what exactly is Adobe Photoshop updating? I don’t think Photoshop needs updating, I also think it’s very annoying. I even had to add another 1GB RAM just for Photoshop to run smoothly.
Meant to comment on this when I saw it on the 2nd, but work got in the way…
Overall, this post was a very good thing, but a bit of a mixed bag. Thumbs up to Barry for his candour. Thumbs down to Eric for his, frankly, weasly words about alleged complexity. I’m late to the party here, so I’ll settle for endorsing the comments several posters have made about Adobe not being so “special” that it can’t use the exact same technology that manages to successfully install OS X, Final Cut Studio, MS Office and other mildly complex software. If the Apple installer really is as unusable as you claim then, quite honestly, you’re doing something wrong with the architecture of the whole suite.
(sort of) OT: When John wrote that he was asking the installer team to comment directly, I was highly skeptical, since the same thing had been said about the disgusting pricing disparity between the US and the rest of the world, and yet here we are still awaiting any kind of justification.
When are people responsible for the price-raping going to step up to the plate?
All-
We recognize that there are many opportunities to improve our Updater and you will see significant changes in CS5.
Unlike what we do typically with our applications, I am planning on being very open about the requirements and plans we have for CS5 Installers and Updaters once we get a little further along with the initial planning.
There will be some changes we make that will address several of the most important issues raised here.
I want to thank you again for both the public blog comments and the emails you have sent me – they have made a difference already and I anticipate a rich and continuing conversation as we move through the CS5 cycle.
Thanks,
Barry
Sr. Director, Creative Suite Engineering and Program Management
bhills@adobe.com
I’m a PC. I feel lost in here with all the Mac comments. But I feel a need to repeat myself from the original thread.
I think it’s unreasonable to have to call Adobe just to activate/install my new CS4 extended Photoshop upgrade.
If the installer worked in a quirky Vista x64 way I’d be happy, BUT I had to call Adobe to obtain the secret magic keystroke codes, to activate the product with a new CS4 extended serial number.
The shipping CS4 PS extended installer never finds my existing CS2 or CS3 PS, and doesn’t like either the CS2 or the CS3 serial numbers:
Upgrade Check
We looked in the default locations for qualifying products and none were found.
But they are here, understandably on Vista x64:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CS2
C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CS3
Non standard locations to this installer! No option is available to search for them or use a different CD or product version ! There is no option available to select anything but a CS3 extended product with the upgrade installer.
It’s quite clear to me this was either never tested OR considered important to provide for. They would rather I call on the phone and repeat all the magic numbers I have, before I learn theirs. Everytime I install this product.
As Adobe’s apps become ever more complex and the installers struggle to keep up, the experience of installing (and often using) goes down. It’s as simple as that. It makes space for simpler applications like Pixelmator et al. or online versions such as the Aviary suite at the bottom end. Adobe may or may not care about this, but it will nibble and then bite away at their bottom end market share.
The problem is compounded by Adobe reaching for enterprise level licencing because the installers (which should have been sorted in CS2 after many pleas – not shunted to CS5 or 6) are so awful in those situations. Many large enterprise situations outside of large agencies and studios may not need the power and complexity of Photoshop. They might just need a decent image editor and those alternatives exist. I can’t help feeling Adobe are in danger of being the IE to Mozilla’s Firefox.
I’d like to also report that the CS4 adobe updater does not work through a proxy. CS3 updater works just fine with the same proxy (Microsoft ISA Server). How about adding this “feature” back in Adobe that existed in CS3!
In our educational environment we must use a proxy server, so out of the question to (1) disable proxy or connect to raw internet and (2) manually update our CS4 workstations.
The Adobe Updater 6 does not appear to even respect computer settings on OSX 10.4 or 10.5 , what is wacky is that all is well with Adobe Updater 5 on the same machine thru a proxy, so I’m not laying the blame on the proxy.
Please patch. We’re using version 6.02.1471 of the “Adobe Updater” for CS4.
Are you kidding? I am upgrading from CS/CS2, and I’m sorry this won’t help you retire early, I will be skipping CS5.
How about, for starters, putting out a document that explains all of the setup choices IN CS4 so that we can make informed decisions as to what we would like to install. Do I need extensions? I need to know what the heck an extension is, thank you.
Secondly, write some code that allows uninstallation of the KR^P your installer has spewn all over my until now perfectly running Vista 64 installation. I even knew enough to UNCHECK the ADOBE DRIVE option but it still installed it. YUCK.
[Sorry about that. I’ve confirmed that there’s an installer bug that causes Adobe Drive to be installed on Win64 systems regardless of whether you’ve unchecked that option. –J.]
By the way, the Lightroom 2 installer works great, so please leave it alone.
A little feedback to Adobe folks commenting above. I’m sure you’re all very sincere and can’t necessarily be held responsible for what’s been done in the past. But… man does it make me CRINGE every time I hear something about how you’ll make it better in CS5!!! Geez. For the record, I heard this in regards to how CS4 would greatly improve CS3. And, while there has been some notable improvement, the answer to why things are so bad now (like in updater) is to say it’ll be better later!? Without yelling let me suggest this: fix updater, fix it for CS4, send out a regular updater to do this.
[I think that’s just what’s in the works. I’ve asked the team to provide more info & am presently waiting to get those details. –J.]
Thanks!
Scott Adams wrote “I’ll never be able to get back all the time I wasted–not just downloading the CS3 suite 3 times before the 3rd download finally installed properly, but then having constant license issues shut down each application over and over, and having to spend hours and hours of time on the phone with tech people who I was certain I knew more about the product than they did. Up until about a week or two ago my Adobe Acrobat Pro was still giving me a “product not activated” error and I was having to repair the installation at least once a week–a process that took at least a half hour, not including the reboot time.”
I had a similar problem with Photoshop CS3. It took several efforts to load CS3 and even then it was so unstable that I never closed the program on my computer as I could never be sure how long it would take to get it to open successfully and then how long it would be before it crashed again. “Adobe Help” finally suggested Dell was at fault ( I had a new Dell laptop)whereas Dell claimed not to be responsible for third party software. As a hobbyist I had no where to turn having spent a lot on a piece of software that would not load reliably and having gone past the return date. I got tired of reading dialogue boxes telling me something was wrong with the license. In Dell’s defense, every other piece of software I loaded worked flawlessly; in Adobe’s defense ,after six months of frustration, I followed advice from an internet chat about the same problem with CS3 not loading properly on my model of laptop – the recommended solution was to reload the Vista operating system which cured the instability in Photoshop. I still fail to understand why I had to look to internet based hobbyists to come up with a solution.
To add to Andrew’s comments and to provide Adobe with some feedback–lemme tell you about my recent experience with Color Finesse crashing every time I launch it from AECS4. Naturally, being a pro, I knew to START with google to find a solution. Seems like it’s not much of an issue (yet?)… maybe it’s just me. So, I went and clicked “ask adobe support” and took the time to fill in the form (with details of my video driver and such). But when I submit, it gives me a 404/ “Page Does Not Exist”. So, I’m really not bitching here (though it’s incredibly frustrating)… Adobe is very nice to me as I’m a “community expert”. However, I post this here because I think they ought to know the system is a total failure as is.
Hey John, thanks for you guys making yourselves available on this blog. It’s been an interesting read (this thread in particular), and lots of useful information on your blog as a whole. My recent experience upgrading to CS4 from CS2 (and also upgrading some portions of the company from CS3 yet to be done) has all been positive. The Deployment Toolkit functions like a charm, and the company’s SMS geek was actually pleased with it… I have to say that I’m pleased with (so far) features and functions of CS4, and our designers are lined up wanting to know how soon the whole package deploys to them (it will be another few weeks, as we won’t be making a full deployment until a production cycle competes).
Awww… no commenting for me I guess. That makes me sad, it was a long one to write too. Hopefully I’ll at least get a response, and the comment won’t just be deleted and forgotten.
Very interesting reading if your a teckie, but I’m just a person that want’s to install her Christmas Present. I’ve read, so much on CS4, and still have no conclusion to a fix. I have spoke to Adobe Support yesterday, they were to call me back at 6:30 am this morning and you guessed it no call… What are the non professionals supposed to do or think? I just want my money back and I will not by another adobe photo shop program again. It is almost fraud to knowingly sell inferior products. I just don’t know what to do. I paid over $1000.00 Canadian for something that is usless to me.
Shame on Adobe for letting this product go to market, knowing there were so many problems.
We’ll since I’ve been up since 5:30 am waiting for a phone call, I will go get a Tim Horton Coffee. That you can depend on and go to work.
Thank goodness I don’t need that program for work purposes.
All this talk about the next CS5 and CS6 really irritates me when you can’t support the CS4.
All of you have written very good comments, and I have learned alot.
Regards,
Betsy
I really don’t get it what’s the problem on this installer topic.
The greater headache should be for instance that Photshop became insanely more weight than After Effects.
As Ae CS4 has been announced i felt like christmas, then i visited IBC and talked to the oh-we’re-so-excited-about this-release product managers without having the ability to take a very closer look into Ae CS4.
Then Ae CS4 came out and i gave it a try, but it was like a hit in the head as i figured out that the whole thing was just a 20:80 deal compared to Ps. So i decided not to buy either.
if i figure out that Ae CS5 does not have at least 30% implementation from the smallest feature requests and wishlists which are already dating back to 2004, i believe that i will completely drop Ae and concentrate more on other Compositing/VFX products.
For my opinion: a discussion on installers – which makes 0.05% in usage compared to how much i really want to do with an application.
So please, keep on not just saying that you’re listening, just DO it right.
Thank you.
Has this bug been fixed?
[Sorry about that. I’ve confirmed that there’s an installer bug that causes Adobe Drive to be installed on Win64 systems regardless of whether you’ve unchecked that option. –J.]
[No, nor do I expect it to be changed in CS4. –J.]
Hi Betsy-
Send me an email at bhills@adobe.com and include your Tech Support case number and I will get it escalated for you and get you up and running quickly.
-Barry
Pierre-
Are you the Pierre from Nova Scotia that had the great feedback on the installer user experience?
If so, please send me an email (bhills@adobe.com) and let me know when you are able to connect as I want to provide some feedback on the items we discussed.
Thanks,
Barry
Although it seems a little late to weigh in I simply have to get this out of my system.
As many before me I experienced some horrible stuff regarding the Installer and it’s seems amazing to me that a bunch of so highly-intelligent people seem to be unable to fix all those problems.
One of my biggest problems of all is the fact that when I simply want to install ONE app, the installer puts so much useless stuff on my hard drive. I don’t need or want Air, Bridge, Reader and so on. I also don’t want the new Fonts. So can I deselect them? Of course, not. It installs so much overhead to my hard drive that it always drives me nuts when I only think about it.
One side story: because I was unsure if those “useless” apps were really useless I renamed the folders and…well, Illustrator still worked like a charm.
And now today. Just some hours ago I wanted to install PS CS4. Okay. Illustrator CS4 is already installed as well as all that useless stuff, so it should no problem. Yeah, sure.
What happened was really a simply bad user experience. For one, it took minutes of system checking until it told me I should quit MS Word(!), to install Photoshop. Then, after doing as told, I reached the selection screen. Okay, at the top I see a list of Installed Apps. There are no check marks anywhere. So why did it take so long to check the system? And why did it need to check it anyway? Because it already checked the system?
Okay, back to business. There are no check marks. Funnily enough the installer tells me it needs 250MB of hard disk space. What does that mean? Does the installer know what has been installed, or not? On the other hand, it is impossible since the useless stuff alone takes up more than 600MB.
Frustrated by the contradictory information I get, I select Photoshop CS4 and the wow happens. Suddenly check marks come up everywhere and the needed disk space jumps to 1.4 Gig. Although PS only uses a fracture of it and seemingly the useless stuff is already installed. What happened? Does it mean I have to install the useless stuff again?
Because when looking closer, Illustrator CS4 is of course in the list of installed apps, but a check mark is missing. What does this mean? Because the useless stuff (Air, Bridge, Reader) in the same list has one. And by unchecking them the needed amount gets lower.
Seriously, what is the installer trying to tell me? I do not know.
And this is just the experience from today. Seriously, you need to revamp this from the scratch. Don’t try to be Mr. Smart Guy who tries to impress. Let me get the useless job stuff of installing applications get done within minutes with full control of *everything*.
It is never good when the user doesn’t know what’s going on and has no control over the type of installation.
Heck, even the Windows Programmers at MS got it right.
And heck, it really speaks for something when the installation of Windows 7 in a virtual environment on a MacBook Pro takes less time than the installation of a single Photoshop.
Certainly I would agree with earlier comments in the post, why do we have to wait until CS5 to correct installer problems. Is it really a big deal to do a CS4 1.1 installer?!?!?!
With 600 fewer staff, I hope Adobe is flushing the dead wood from their dev team and hiring new talent who are more up to speed on Apple software distribution guidelines. I’ve moved on to Pixelmator and VectorDesigner for the time being, hoping not to have to touch Adobe CS5 or CS6 until Adobe get their act together.
Don Montalvo, NYC
I’ve had a very positive experience with CS4 on my *laptop*. The entire Master Collection CS4 installed exactly in 30 minutes on Windows 7 Release Candidate. I have 3 GB RAM, 5400 RPM HD, Merom 1.86 GHz processor.
I don’t know is mine is a new problem on one that’s been known for a while. I just got CS4 Design Premium. No matter what I do it WILL NOT install Photoshop Extended CS4 that’s supposed to be a part of the suite. It will install regular PS CS4. I’ve uninstalled the PS CS4 that I had on the machine, I even ran the ‘CS4 clean up script’ and still all I get it regular PS CS4, where’s the PS Extended I paid for?
Eri M
Do you know when CS5 will get out?
[Yes. –J.]
I think i’m too late to talk about this, hopefully it has been implemented.
Using a master copy to network install different versions – will save us HEAPS of space..
Progress bar installer..
Less restrictive on apps having to be closed..
Doesn’t require fqdn paths in the installer configs..
Better error messages..
Also releasing new installers for cs3 and cs4 with these features would be nice.
Please change your installers to .pkg. I have a ton of installs to do and your method for mass deployment of CS4 is terrible to say the least. It’s going to take countless man hours to walk around with the DVD to 200 Macs. With a .pkg this could have been done overnight thru Apple Remote Desktop. My 2 cents.
PROBLEM: Making .cdr files (disk images) cause kernal Panics in Mac OS-X. Not sure why. I thought maybe there was corruption in the original images so I re-imaged it. – NO LUCK! I put it on several different network volumes AFP – SMB NO LUCK! I find this very odd but can not find a exact reason for it.
Barry and Crew — I’m just now encountering some, if not all, of the install issues for Flash CS4 that others have been experiencing, which led me to this blog. All that aside, while commercial clothing retail may seem vastly different from yours, my career puts me in the front lines of customer service on a daily basis as well. I felt I should take a moment to thank you, sincerely, for posting this information, and being a brave enough soul to be as truthful and candid on an open forum as you have been. So, even though the product you represent may not be hassle-free, your candor has been a welcome breath of fresh air.
I have two computers. Both brand new XP machines.
1. Installation went perfect.
2. Hung at 90 percent. Have tried everything I can but will not go past 90 percent.
No way will I reinstall windows over it.
Don’t even get me started on the Activation issues (though I’ve had all of them resolved finally with an email after the public apology letter came out).
It’s very frustrating. The Master Collection cost a good deal of money not to be able to install it.
I have been using computers since they became available. I am an engineer, designer,….
From the start Adobe has been cumbersome and overly restrictive. I am guessing partly due to the heavy lifting it is doing but there is something in how your software is written or executed that makes it too complex. As others have said it is like laying on a second OS. While many here admire your willingness to talk, I and my clients admire things that work, are solid, and do not get in the way of what is being done. Please talk and listen more but in the meantime remove the layer of mud or keep your resumes up to date because it appears that many are just waiting to jump to a better experience. There are so many examples of companies who literally owned the market and lost it that I couldn’t hope to list them all. But for fun let’s think about Apple, AOL, Netscape, etc. My hope is that you muster up some corporate courage and vision and make it work. My guess is that you will be remembered for once owning the world and losing it.
I realize I’m coming to the party over a year late, but yeah, what Nick said.
I’m still on CS3 with no money for an upgrade — and CS3 looks damn good to me, thank you — if it weren’t for the blasted installer problem.
EVERY SINGLE TIME I open ANY Adobe product, I instantly get the bloody icon jumping up and down like a dervish demanding my attention. When I give it attention, I discover two issues:
1. It wants to upgrade Updater itself (and needs my Administrative password) AND will shut down all Adobe, Safari, and other crap, to do this. And takes For-evvvvvv-er.
Problem is, after going through 15-30 minutes to upgrade the Updater, it FAILS. Always. Every time. Without exception. And then, tells me I need to Upgrade the Updater and starts all over the frack again. With the fracking whirling dervish of an Icon jumping up and down and insisting that I pay attention to it, and an big Update Box SMACK in the middle of my blasted screen.
If I wanted to use Windows, I run multiple datacenters for a Fortune 500 company. I simply prefer Mac OS X and BSD for my personal life.
So I have to cancel out of the endless loop of the Updater demanding that I pay it attention, as no matter what I try — and I’ve even tried command line strings which call the Update process directly with elevated privileges, NOTHING FRACKING WORKS.
2. What is worse, is while the Updater is open, it tells me I have a Butt-Load (that’s more than ten, less then thirty) of other Adobe updates which are NOT getting done, as all of them are — apparently — waiting on the Updated Updater, for which, see #1 above.
Aaaaaaaaargh!
I would pretty much give up the right to complain about anything else about Adobe for the next year, if y’all would fix this stupid Updating process.
As everyone else — except for those sucking up and saying ‘oh, how wonderful that you’re being open about your process’, which I respect, and have been around enough companies to know not everyone is like that, but simply expect as the minimum level I’m willing to tolerate working with on any kind of regular basis unless my boss demands otherwise, and this is a PERSONAL decision, not professional — I insist that a MAC OS X install be done in a simple, easy way, which respects the user, is effortless to uninstall, lets us choose what we want, how we want it, where we want it. This isn’t 2000. It’s 2010. And none of this is rocket science. I have a friend — several of them, actually — who ARE rocket scientists. Installing a platform for multiple point-install products on OS X is NOT rocket science OR the computer science which goes on either NASA or even a Boeing airliner. Because you do NOT want a Boeing 787 on short-final to pop up an Install Icon on the jetliner’s Head’s Up Display, Bounce, Bounce, Bounce, Bounce, DEMANDING it be paid attention to, only to discover that a) you have to reboot everything you are working on — radios, cabin pressure, fuel flow, instruments, and oh yeah, what are they called? Engines. I realize of course that Adobe’s Installer does not MAKE you choose the worse possible moment to shut everything down, such as short-final. No, it simply bugs you over and over and over again every time you try and work with ANY of the multitude of products you have paid for, until you do.
And since the Updater Never, ever, ever, ever, EVER actually updates itself, then every time you try and use any of the Adobe products — which ARE useful, which is why I paid for them to begin with — I get stuck back in one of these circles of Hell. Thus my comparison to rocket science and Boeing aircraft (which lets you know at least where I live, and how I come to know real-live rocket scientists. We have a number of them up here in addition to the ones at Boeing; I’m talking about the new ones, working for Paul and Jeff.)
Anyway…
I know this is over a year late. But the problem is still there. And I’m sure I’m not alone in saying that for me, this issue has taken ALL the enjoyment out of Adobe for me. Now, where before I used to reach for Adobe products without hesitation, now I hesitate. I weigh every potential use against the pure bloody hell of dealing with that fracking ‘I hate the stupid thing SO SO SO much’ Updater. And more times than not, more and more often, I chose a different product or a different way to produce my end result.
Funny… it turns out I don’t need Adobe nearly as much as I thought that I did.
And as professionally, I make and recommend purchasing decisions in the many many millions of dollars at a Fortune 500 company, THAT is what you should be paying attention to. That and fixing your busted installation.
Happy New Year. Welcome to 2010.
Hah! Found the answer. THE FOLLOWING WORKS for MAC OS X.
Open Terminal. Run the following. (I have a root account on my system, however this is done from my normal account.)
Home $:sudo /Applications/Utilities/Adobe\ Utilities.localized/Adobe\ Updater5/Adobe\ Updater.app/Contents/MacOS/Adobe\ Updater
It will ask for your PASSWORD. Give it YOUR password, NOT the Root Password. Hit Enter.
The Updater should run. It may even download a New Updater. You may have to reenter your password once or twice. At some point it may take from 20 minutes to several hours to download a LOT of updates.
Where IS the Updater, and where are the Updates being downloaded to, then being automatically deleted from as they run? Great question.
You will see on the Updater when it is running, that it has a “default” location which you can change. Check it to make sure it matches with what I’m about to give you. This is what mine says, and mine works.
lgapjac1:Install jwe$ cd “/Users/jwe/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Updater5/Install”
lgapjac1:Install jwe$ ls -al
total 16
drwxr-xr-x 15 jwe staff 510 Jan 3 03:24 .
drwxr-xr-x 8 jwe staff 272 Jan 3 03:45 ..
-rw-r–r–@ 1 jwe staff 6148 Jan 3 03:49 .DS_Store
drwxr-xr-x 4 jwe staff 136 Jan 3 03:24 AdobeUpdater
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:39 assetservice3
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:25 bridge2
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:08 cameraraw4
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:39 devicecentral1
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:04 estoolkit2
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:40 fireworks9-en_US
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:22 flash9-en_US
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:42 illustrator13-en_US
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:05 photoshop10-en_US
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:44 versioncueclient3
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:44 versioncueserver3
lgapjac1:Install jwe$
As you can see EVERYTHING is placed in the “Install” directory down under Updater5. Then there are individual directories the Install directory for each product.
The full path is: “/Users/jwe/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Updater5/Install”
That is what should come up if you give a PWD command, except without the quotes. Then the various subdirectories will or will not be there, totally depending on IF you’ve ever downloaded an updated for that program or not. If you have, there will be a subdirectory. If you have not, there will not be.
The updates get downloaded into a directory and stay there ONLY until they are accepted and um, loaded isn’t the right word, as they’re already, um, loaded, or at least down-loaded, sitting there in a .dmg file. You could, I’m guessing, click on them individually and hand-load them. Though it would be better to load them from Terminal using sudo, as that way you don’t run into permissions issues, which is why the fracking Update program always keeps failing; it is a permissions problem. (And yeah, you would think that Adobe would figure out how to make a MAC OS X program load without requiring us to sudo anything. My Gods, it isn’t like this is damn Windows and everything requires being the Windows Administrator, you know? But I digress.) So the .dmg program gets downloaded into the subdirectory when the update is ready, and stays there only until the update is successfully run and is now registered as part of the program. At which point the .dmg update file gets deleted from the Install/program-name subdirectory as part of the updating process. So if you don’t see a .dmg file in there and your weekly check for “do I have any updates” has automatically run (if that is how you have things set) or you’ve just run the Updater from Terminal by hand and it came back saying you do NOT have anything, well, then you’re solid. And as I said, after it tells you you don’t have anything, if you want to be ABSOLUTELY certain, you can always check the subdirectories in “/Users/jwe/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Updater5/Install” to see if there are any .dmg files; if there aren’t (after you’ve run the Updater from Terminal using the sudo command I showed you above and it came back negative) then you are absolutely solid. Assuming that you have THAT PATH (the one I just gave you) in your Updater as the default. You can change the default path in your updater simply by opening Photoshop, telling it to check for updates, and then when the option as to where the default path is comes up, start at the very top of your tree — the top of the disk, and click downwards till you get to the Install directory, using the path I just gave you. That works on my installtion. Just in case, obviously, make a note of your default path in case yours is different. *smiles*)
So… this solves “how to make it work” for me. To do so took me probably 30-40 FUCKING HOURS of work. Thank you Adobe. I really appreciate your goddamn Update process. It was worth paying so much money. I bill out at $225 an hour for Level 3 Troubleshooting which this was. $225*40hrs=$9,000 of my work.
That’s $9 thousand bucks, Adobe. That’s how much I would bill someone to have solved this problem for them. At a minimum, given I haven’t really solved it… I just have a simple minimum solution which I know works on ONE system. Next would come testing on multiple MACs to see if it replicates, then documentation and so on. Figure this will cost them $25-50K before we’re done. But just to get one machine working is nine grand.
I appreciate the business, but since this is MY machine that is broken and you’ve know about this for OVER A YEAR and done NOTHING to fix this know problem, shame on you.
Shame on you shame on you shame on you. Your lack of true customer support is truly something for which you SHOULD be ashamed. And hanging a lantern on it does nothing in my book to make it better.
Jesse Wendel
Sr. Technical Systems Analyst
30 Years in Enterprise Information Technology/Computer Science
Hah! Found the answer. THE FOLLOWING WORKS for MAC OS X.
Open Terminal. Run the following. (I have a root account on my system, however this is done from my normal account.)
Home $:sudo /Applications/Utilities/Adobe\ Utilities.localized/Adobe\ Updater5/Adobe\ Updater.app/Contents/MacOS/Adobe\ Updater
It will ask for your PASSWORD. Give it YOUR password, NOT the Root Password. Hit Enter.
The Updater should run. It may even download a New Updater. You may have to reenter your password once or twice. At some point it may take from 20 minutes to several hours to download a LOT of updates.
Where IS the Updater, and where are the Updates being downloaded to, then being automatically deleted from as they run? Great question.
You will see on the Updater when it is running, that it has a “default” location which you can change. Check it to make sure it matches with what I’m about to give you. This is what mine says, and mine works.
lgapjac1:Install jwe$ cd “/Users/jwe/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Updater5/Install”
lgapjac1:Install jwe$ ls -al
total 16
drwxr-xr-x 15 jwe staff 510 Jan 3 03:24 .
drwxr-xr-x 8 jwe staff 272 Jan 3 03:45 ..
-rw-r–r–@ 1 jwe staff 6148 Jan 3 03:49 .DS_Store
drwxr-xr-x 4 jwe staff 136 Jan 3 03:24 AdobeUpdater
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:39 assetservice3
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:25 bridge2
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:08 cameraraw4
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:39 devicecentral1
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:04 estoolkit2
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:40 fireworks9-en_US
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:22 flash9-en_US
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:42 illustrator13-en_US
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:05 photoshop10-en_US
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:44 versioncueclient3
drwxr-xr-x 2 jwe staff 68 Jan 3 03:44 versioncueserver3
lgapjac1:Install jwe$
As you can see EVERYTHING is placed in the “Install” directory down under Updater5. Then there are individual directories the Install directory for each product.
The full path is: “/Users/jwe/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Updater5/Install”
That is what should come up if you give a PWD command, except without the quotes. Then the various subdirectories will or will not be there, totally depending on IF you’ve ever downloaded an updated for that program or not. If you have, there will be a subdirectory. If you have not, there will not be.
The updates get downloaded into a directory and stay there ONLY until they are accepted and um, loaded isn’t the right word, as they’re already, um, loaded, or at least down-loaded, sitting there in a .dmg file. You could, I’m guessing, click on them individually and hand-load them. Though it would be better to load them from Terminal using sudo, as that way you don’t run into permissions issues, which is why the fracking Update program always keeps failing; it is a permissions problem. (And yeah, you would think that Adobe would figure out how to make a MAC OS X program load without requiring us to sudo anything. My Gods, it isn’t like this is damn Windows and everything requires being the Windows Administrator, you know? But I digress.) So the .dmg program gets downloaded into the subdirectory when the update is ready, and stays there only until the update is successfully run and is now registered as part of the program. At which point the .dmg update file gets deleted from the Install/program-name subdirectory as part of the updating process. So if you don’t see a .dmg file in there and your weekly check for “do I have any updates” has automatically run (if that is how you have things set) or you’ve just run the Updater from Terminal by hand and it came back saying you do NOT have anything, well, then you’re solid. And as I said, after it tells you you don’t have anything, if you want to be ABSOLUTELY certain, you can always check the subdirectories in “/Users/jwe/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Updater5/Install” to see if there are any .dmg files; if there aren’t (after you’ve run the Updater from Terminal using the sudo command I showed you above and it came back negative) then you are absolutely solid. Assuming that you have THAT PATH (the one I just gave you) in your Updater as the default. You can change the default path in your updater simply by opening Photoshop, telling it to check for updates, and then when the option as to where the default path is comes up, start at the very top of your tree — the top of the disk, and click downwards till you get to the Install directory, using the path I just gave you. That works on my installtion. Just in case, obviously, make a note of your default path in case yours is different. *smiles*)
So… this solves “how to make it work” for me. To do so took me probably 30-40 FUCKING HOURS of work. Thank you Adobe. I really appreciate your goddamn Update process. It was worth paying so much money. I bill out at $225 an hour for Level 3 Troubleshooting which this was. $225*40hrs=$9,000 of my work.
That’s $9 thousand bucks, Adobe. That’s how much I would bill someone to have solved this problem for them. At a minimum, given I haven’t really solved it… I just have a simple minimum solution which I know works on ONE system. Next would come testing on multiple MACs to see if it replicates, then documentation and so on. Figure this will cost them $25-50K before we’re done. But just to get one machine working is nine grand.
I appreciate the business, but since this is MY machine that is broken and you’ve know about this for OVER A YEAR and done NOTHING to fix this know problem, shame on you.
Shame on you shame on you shame on you. Your lack of true customer support is truly something for which you SHOULD be ashamed. And hanging a lantern on it does nothing in my book to make it better.
Jesse Wendel
Sr. Technical Systems Analyst
30 Years in Enterprise Information Technology/Computer Science
Its great. The platforms install technology can satisfy the needs for many simpler products.