Other new features from Fireworks CS5

Description

New features and miscallaneous from Adobe Fireworks CS5.

Requirement

Adobe Fireworks CS5 and higher

Article

1. Property Inspector new features



Figure 1: Property Inspector panel

1. Constrain Proportions

The lock icon enables you to proportionally scale width and height of an object. Toggle this icon to switch it ON or OFF. See Figure 1.

2. Gradient Dithering

Gradient dithering is now supported in Fireworks. The gradient dithering feature has been borrowed from the PS arsenal of features. It is expected to work similar to that app but restricted only to Linear and Radial gradients. See Figure 2.

After dithering option has been enabled the 'banding' disappear and the color transition of the gradient becomes much smoother.



Figure 2: Gradient dithering icon

3. Stroke Alignment

To change Stroke Alignment properties you do need to open the Stroke options anymore — just use the new Stroke Alignment icons: Align to Inside, Align to Center, Align to Outside. See Figure 1.

4. Edit Stroke

The Edit Stroke button gives you access to the stroke properties.

5. Compound Shapes Tools

See article: Compound Shapes

2. Reverse Option for Gradients

A new button allows gradients to be reversed. See Figure 3.



Figure 3: Reverse option for gradients

3. Copy to Clipboard Option

This option gives you the ability to copy color values from the color picker just in one click. For Windows only: press Ctrl+C to copy hex colors into the clipboard. See Figure 4.



Figure 4: Copy to clipboard option

4. Global preference for Guides and Grids

In CS4, the settings for Grids and Guides in the Preferences section applied only to the current document. When you opened a new document, Fireworks would return to it’s default values for grids and guides.

In CS5, when you change the grids and guides settings in the Preferences, it becomes a persistent, global setting - all new documents will have those settings (not the Fireworks default values.) Unfortunately, changing the settings in preferences does not update the current document - you need to open a new document to see the new settings to take effect.

You can still change the grids setting and thus override the default setting, for the current document just go to View > Grid > Edit Grid. This option is for Grids only and not for Guides. See Figure 5.



Figure 5: Guides and Grids settings

5. Improved CS5 applications Integration

Integration of Fireworks CS5 with other Adobe CS5 applications is much improved.

1. Fireworks CS5 now supports ASE swatches, the same color file format supported by Illustrator, Photoshop, InDesign and Kuler. See ASE support in Adobe Fireworks CS5
2. Fireworks CS5 can export in the new FXG 2.0 file format. See FXG 2.0 support and Fireworks CS5
3. Fireworks CS5 has very good integration with Adobe Illustrator CS5 and Adobe Photoshop CS5.
4. Fireworks CS5 is fully integrated with Adobe Device Central CS5. See Device Central integration with Fireworks CS5
6. Miscellanous
1. T-icon

Display a T icon in the Layers panel to indicate a Text layer. T icons show text objects in the Layers panel. See Figure 5.



Figure 5: T icons

2. Selecting an object on the canvas should automatically highlight its parent layer in the layers panel. Huge time saver. See Figure 6.



Figure 6:

3. Page numbering. You can add or remove page numbering in the Pages panel. When page numbering is ON, you will get 01, 02, 03, ... before the page names. See Figure 7.



Figure 7: page numbering

4. Double-byte fonts (Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Hebrew, Arabic, etc.) are more logically organized in the Fonts menus.

A better support for double byte fonts means that they are now displayed correctly as per their families rather than getting listed randomly. Also, selecting a double byte font will set its style as regular by default, unlike the first style directly in the font style drop down, as earlier

7. Conclusion

Better performance, stability, installation and memory enhancements. Ability to handle larger multipage files and better handling of large files from earlier Fireworks versions. Fireworks CS5 is an excellent webdesign and wireframing tool.

Where to go from here

1. Fireworks CS5 Help