Just reading the comments here; what I see is a bunch of loyal pros who love the program, and some feel hurt because of Corel policy.
Corel is great. It has apps. and power that makes it a workhorse in the business environment.
I started with CorelDraw3, and had Chris's book in my lap as I labored on a 486-50Mz to learn it.
Crash, Crash, Crash. Thought it was my computer, until I realized that the only thing that ever crashed was Corel. We all discovered later that Corel3 had more bugs in it than an Orkin commercial. I still haven't quite forgiven them. Corel4 wasn't much better. I almost missed a deadline on a project once because CorelMove kept crashing just as I was finishing a sequence; got it completed once, saved the completed project to video output tape, and discovered corruptions that made it unable to run on the client's computers. That was on a Pentium machine. There were other instances.
Sorry, guys, facts are facts. The big shops don't use Corel because it has a rep for releasing buggy products. Want a job in a big shop? Learn Illustrator and Photoshop. Of course to be fair, the shops run Apple systems, and that has a lot to do with it also. But I have had several artists tell me that they have constant problems with Corel files.
As far as upgrades? Corel always has been a bottom-line company. Since they don't have the licensing income that Adobe has because of its large-shop popularity, they must upgrade regularly for income. And, yes, it is annoying. Now that they have "cut the deadwood" off, I hope the new management will make improvements. I suspect (and I have no facts for this opinion), that Corel is attempting to initiate the crossover from Win9x to Windows 2000/ OS that is coming. Corel has never initiated change very well. It also may be that they don't have the capitol resources to test as thoroughly as they should.
And yes, I shall continue to use CorelDraw. It's a great product for the independent artist, even with the annoyances.
just a thought
ranchhand