Adobe Systems Inc Essay Research Paper Adobe

Adobe Systems, Inc. Essay, Research Paper Adobe Systems, Inc. At a time when the business world was eager for a high-quality way to print documents created on a personal computer (PC), Adobe Systems was positioned with the software technology to not only produce professional images, but create a new industry – desktop publishing. Like so many of the pioneers in the PC industry, John Warnock and Charles Geschke escaped the confining structure of a large corporation and used their entrepreneurial spirit and knowledge to move the industry forward. In the early 1980s, as IBM was about to announce its move into the PC market, Warnock and Geschke were working at Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) to develop a page-description language (PDL) called Interpress. Frustrated

with Xerox’s refusal to introduce Interpress, Warnock and Geschke decided to go into business for themselves. Warnock had written flight simulation software and Geschke had run the PARC electronic printing lab for Xerox. Considering briefly the copying business and office printing, they finally turned to what they knew best, writing specialized software. In 1982 they started Adobe Systems, Inc. and began to work on solving some of the long-standing problems that plagued the relationship between PCs and printers. Solving Old Problems For a PC to work with a printer, software developers had to include print commands, called drivers, in the software. A different driver had to be written for each of dozens of printers. In addition, each of the text fonts that would be available to

a printer had to be included in a full range of sizes. There was also a language barrier between the PC and the printer that didn’t allow the printer to get a full description of the page, only the text and fonts; users couldn’t print exactly what they saw on their screen and they were unable to manipulate the text or change it until after it was printed. At the time, changing the layout of the text or adding graphic images was typically done by a graphic artist who would physically cut and paste the document together after it was printed, then send the pasted-up pages to a commercial printer. The solution for Warnock and Geschke was to create PDL software that would work for the PC and the printer; a common language that would not only let the user manipulate the text, but

enable any printer to print what the user saw on the screen. Creating a New Industry Although Adobe was ignored by most of the PC industry, it did attract the attention of Apple Computers, which was in the process of developing a new laser printer for its Macintosh PC. By 1984, Adobe had revenues of over $2 million, 68 percent of which came from Apple. Revenue for 1985 more than doubled when Apple Computers introduced the Apple LaserWriter. This $7,000 laser printer came with Adobe PostScript, a PDL that gave the user more flexibility than ever before. Together, Apple and Adobe had created desktop publishing. Adobe PostScript used a coded description of the page, including a mathematical description of the text, to communicate directions to the printer controller card, a Motorola

68000 microprocessor with at least 1MB of memory. By storing fonts in an outline format description rather than as a library of font sizes, text could be manipulated to appear as white on black, shaded, a mirror image, or be stretched, compressed, or manipulated to produce a variety of effects. PostScript language treated the text and graphics identically. Because only one printer driver was needed for all PostScript-equipped printers, the program was machine independent. With PostScript, a printed page was a combination of the text and graphics, formatting commands, and the PostScript PDL. This allowed business PC users to be creative in the layout and presentation of information and produce dramatically improved documents on their printers. With desktop publishing, a business