Designer Pro 6 - two things missing ...

[Loggy]

DP6 is clearly a very complete product. I now have the CDs and the manual and this makes some interesting bed-time reading (what a sad git!).

But there are two things missing from this publishing system:

1) You still cannot upload AFAIK by sftp/scp fallback. Using FTP is frowned on by many people (and I start and stop proftpd on my server only for this purpose). Please add SFTP as an option - it should be pretty simple to do compared to all the other goodies.

2) Tables. While I know they are frowned on by div purists for websites, for a complete publishing system they are needed. Creating them by patching together boxes etc is not really good enough. And copying in Word documents is such a shame. I see we now have lists that were not in Xtreme 5 so clearly Xara is listening. Maybe there is some technical reason but tables are needed. Please.

I am waiting for the next upgrade to include these goodies...

[gwpriester]

You can use an outside FTP client that supports secure uploads (if your isp supports it).

Tables? It is one of the few still missing DTP components. Maybe next time.

[Ampa]

2) Tables. While I know they are frowned on by div purists

Tables are only frowned upon for the layout of webpage elements where the information is not tabular data. If you want to layout data then they are the ideal solution - indeed that is why they exist!

+1 for a table tool in Xara.

[StevenWWinters]

Vote here for table tool:

http://www.talkgraphics.com/showthre...ular-Text-Data

[Loggy]

You can use an outside FTP client that supports secure uploads (if your isp supports it).

Given all the complex operations carried out by DP6 (and WD6 for that matter) I would have thought that implementing sftp/scp uploads was a walk in the park and it would make it much easier than either starting ftpd on the server (if you have access) or exporting the site to the PC and using WinSCP or something like that to copy it up.... Moreover many users of this almost entirely graphical CLI-free software would not know how to do it if their ISP insisted on sftp/scp to upload.

[gwpriester]

I agree with you on principal. But the problem as you point out, has to do with the ISP. I wanted a more secure method of FTP file transfer, so I contacted my ISP who is one of the big players and they responded that they only support one protocol. Other ISPs I suspect only support a different protocol. However, imperfect though it is, they all support plain vanilla FTP.

This is more a case of a lack of industry standards.

Xara provides a method of uploading files. But if they tried to support all the different protocols, they would be in the FTP application business (which is not a bad idea )

[Loggy]

Gary and list

Just some points:

• adding sftp/scp to the present upload options cannot be a major operation
• I am not suggesting removing ftp at all
• some hosting companies specifically do not support ftp for good security reasons
• users cannot in general modify policies (unless they have root access of course)
• some users may have multiple sites hosted on different servers to maintain
• many users just want to get on with site design and don't want to be bothered with such problems.

As far as tables are concerned, the inclusion would make DP6 a complete DTP application. Importing from Word or another word processor is rather a poor option. It is not only about web design of course - all document preparation systems include tables.

Perhaps someone in Cambridge has been listening...???

[gwpriester]

I would expect table support in one of the next releases. Little by little Xara has added to the DTP text editing tools. But they do seem to add new features in a rather piecemeal fashion. But we now have linking text areas, tabs, indents, bullet lists, find and replace and a few more that have been added in recent years. Style sheets and master pages would be nice. And there are quite a few more on my list.

Specifically support for epub documents. I am currently struggling with InDesign CS5 to create an e-book of stereograms for the Apple store and it is a long and tedious, not to mention, poorly documented process.

[pauland]

Until the thread was started, I had never heard of sftp. I suspect that as long as the FTP transfers will work, 99.9% of Xara users won't care how their designs are transferred and I doubt that in that case Xara will either.

[gwpriester]

True but the point is a valid one. I had about 10 sites infected with malware that were probably due to lack of a secure FTP connection. This is becoming more and more of a common occurrence. The sophistication of the bad guys out there increases on a daily basis. We need all the help we can get.

Having your client's legitimate website blocked with a Malware warning is not good for your client or your reputation. And as any of us who have been through this nightmare, getting those warning/blocking pages removed is a lot of time and effort.