Adobe InDesign CS review

The manual integration with GoLive is useful for standalone designers wanting to republish to the Web, but of course such a hands-on process isn't suited for large scale industrial publishing. This is where InDesign's XML support comes in, allowing tagged text to be flowed into publication templates, edited in situ and then exported again to be reprocessed for re-use on the Web. InDesign CS offers a number of new features such as support for DTDs (Document Type Definitions) and validation, and the ability to map tags to character styles and even nested styles and vice versa to make this XML-based workflow smoother and more robust.

Alongside its Web output, InDesign offers another important form of electronic publishing thanks to its ability to export publications to PDF, which can then be viewed in Acrobat Reader.

Extra support for PDF includes a new Bookmark palette. This lets you set up a customized navigational hierarchy for your document. Bookmarks can be saved right back to PDF 1.3 format for maximum compatibility, but the new 128-bit encryption and permission-based restrictions are reserved for the latest 1.5 format Acrobat files. It's also possible to save layered information, such as comments on the layout, which can then be hidden or displayed in the latest Acrobat 6 Professional.

Potentially the most exciting features of the new PDF 1.5 format are its radically improved interactivity and multimedia capabilities. InDesign CS takes advantage of these with a new Button tool that lets you create rollover effects and apply basic actions: goto page, bookmark, URL and so on. You can also now place audio, video and even SWF animations in your layout, which can either be linked to the PDF or directly embedded; a poster image can be displayed when the media isn't playing, and you can set playback options. In other words InDesign CS begins to move from traditional static publishing into dynamic publishing.

Ultimately the output by which InDesign CS will primarily be judged is its ability to produce high quality commercial print. PDF export plays a crucial role here too and the new ability to output to the PDF/X-1A and PDF/X-3 ISO standards for CMYK and colour-managed exchange and separated output is especially important. Also welcome is the new ability to set up customisable bleed and slug areas around the printable page, on which you can add project-based details such as printing instructions, and to control whether these are displayed in InDesign's preview mode and exported to PDF. Crucially you can also use the new Flattener Preview palette to see exactly how InDesign will handle its most advanced design features, such as transparency and object feathering, when it comes to outputting as print or PDF.

The Flattener Preview palette is invaluable as, by highlighting undesirable features such as text rasterization, it can help ensure that you won't have any nasty surprises when the print run is finally delivered. Even more important on this front is InDesign's new Separations Preview palette. This acts much like the Channels palette in Photoshop to enable you to see the individual spot or process inks, or any combination of these inks, as they will appear on the final colour-separated plates. This means that you can proof your separations onscreen and spot potentially expensive mistakes such as incorrect overprint or knockout settings. Best of all, this power isn't made available in a separate dialog but directly within the InDesign environment so that you can immediately fix any problems that you uncover.