[pdftex] OT: Linux AR 7.0 released: another comment

[Nelson H. F. Beebe]

Maarten Sneep <maarten.sneep at xs4all.nl> writes off list on Sat, 30 Apr
2005 08:44:37 +0200 in response to my posting about default window
sizes in Adobe Acrobat Reader 7.0 on GNU/Linux:

>> ...
>> In Mac OS X, in the preferences window, on the "Page Display" tab,
>> there is a checkbox titled "Open windows maximized, except when
>> document specifies otherwise".
>> ...

Here is what the GNU/Linux version has in the Edit -> Preferences ->
Page Display menu path:

	Page Display
		_ Default Page Layout:	|Single Page|
		x Display large images
		_ Display page to edge
		_ Display transparency grid
		x Use logical page numbers
		_ Use CoolType
		_ Overprint Preview
		x Smooth text		x Smooth line art	x Smooth images
		_ Use greek text below	|6| pixels

	Resolution
		x Use system setting		Current Display: 91 Pixels/Inch
		_ Custom resolution		|72| Pixels/Inch

	Magnification
		Default Zoom: 		|Automatic|
		Max Fit Visible Zoom:	|800%|

There is no box similar to what Maarten describes on Mac OS X.

Part of the problem with Adobe Acrobat is that there are three
different development groups: Windows, Mac OS, and Unix.  They only
get together at intervals to merge the results of their work.  The
first two groups are large, but the last is small: 2--5 people.

I strongly suggested to them in our visits there that their
development model should be changed to work with a thin virtual
platform-independent windowing layer, that was largely independent of
the features of Acrobat, with all the rest of the work devoted to the
code common to all platforms.

If they did it right, all versions would work identically, have the
same GUI appearance, and be released on the same day.  To support this
model, I told them that in xpdf, a GPLed PDF viewer for the X11 Window
System, only about 10% of the code is devoted to the window interface;
I expect that the figures for Acrobat should be similar.

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