User Interface Change?

[rubiksolver]

Re. Creating in the cloud:
Here's an open question to everyone: Imagine that cloud.ixara.com can do everything that Designer can do in the desktop, and maybe more, with a more modern UI. Would you still then prefer to use the desktop version to create and if so why?

I think that most people still prefer to use desktop applications for their creative suites. Seeing the Xara community's concern over a subscription based model, I think moving the application completely to the cloud would be a hard sell. I personally use cloud software for most of my daily work outside of actually designing - Google docs, gmail, trello, dropbox, slack, etc. If the issues of speed and connectivity can be overcome, then I would be happy to use a cloud version if it would provide additional functionality or features.

[jaydear]

I would not subscribe to a Cloud version. I am an insomniac, but I can get myself sleepy again by doing some work on the 'pooter. Where I live in Australia the internet connection often disappears in the wee small hours or when there's a heavy storm, so I'd be sitting here swearing at a Cloud-based Xara which is not calming at all. Our situation will probably be this way for years to come due to the ultra-lame hybrid fibre+copper system that our politicians have chosen to burden us with. So I'm only interested in software that resides on my hardware and which is not dependent on an internet connection. Another point to note is that our internet access is expensive and relatively slow (I can get 20Mbps down- and 4 Mbps up-load speeds if I'm lucky) and I don't need to have additional ongoing expense just to use something I've already paid for. The assumption by software developers that everyone has high speed up and down and a cheap 24/7 internet connection with unlimited data is seriously flawed.

[wizard509]

For various reasons I would not like a cloud based system either.
Email is only internet software I use which can be problematic.
Then there is the issue of those using laptops away from any means of internet connection (even if only for a short time) but still want to use the software. What then?