Sarthak

1. Pixel radius definition for primitive rectangle. The radius can be changed even after the rectangle is 9 slice scaled. This is apart from defining it in percentage values.

2. Restricting the scaling down of objects which have 9 slice scaling applied to it. This prevents the objects from getting distorted for vector and bitmap objects.
3. States and Layers panel have a small radio button kind of functionality which allows for moving the objects from 1 state/layer to the other layer/state without any issues. When an object is selected contained in the State or Layer the radio button is enabled. Once the button is enabled designer can move just the radio button which inturn moves all the selected objects under it.

4. The vector objects like Line, Ellipse, and Polygon now show up with names unlike just "Path" as was present in earlier versions.

5. When guides are present on a document, pressing shift will show the distance between 2 guides on the canvas in pixels.

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1. Guides on the master page will be visible on child pages. Any new guides added will also get reflected on the child pages. Guide location changes made in the master will reflect on child pages. Child page can override the master page guide settings.
2. In the symbol properties panel, user needs to press Enter to reflect the changes in fields like labels.
3. Loading of flash panels are delayed. This will reduce the launch time and use memory stamp only for panels which are used by users. There are 8 flash panels by default in Fireworks CS4.
4. Anti-aliasing for vectors is much smoother now. It is due to new rendering mechanism added in CS4 version.
5. Mouse wheel scrolling in panels
• Mac:  Layers, Pages, states, Common Library
• Win: All panels

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1. Master Page Optimize settings can be carried over on to the child pages.  For optimize settings to be inherited by child pages, they need to be linked. Child page can override the master page optimize settings. Alternatively when the optimize settings for child page is modified, the linking goes off and the master page optimize settings are overridden.
2. Designers can now select multiple pages and change the optimize settings in one shot. It will be reflected in all pages.
3. Layers contextual menu has a new menu item called "Share Layer To All Pages". This option will share the selected layer across all the existing pages.
4. Another option added to the Layers contextual menu item is "Exclude Shared Layer". This option will remove the shared layer on current page without affecting it on the other pages.
5. The contextual menu can be accessed by right clicking in the layers panel. Similar right click functionality has been added to Pages and States panels.
6. Icons use for Extensible Flash Panels. Users can now place icons along with swf files, which will be considered as panel icons in workspace.The icons need to be png files. The name of the png file should be the same as panel name. Mouse over behavior can also be specified an icon and its name should be ‘panelName_over.png’

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Thank you all the designers for upgrading to Fireworks CS4 version.

I have been reading about some stability issues with this Fireworks release which seems to be crashing or generating unexpected behavior at different work flows. I would request all the designers to be a little more patient and post some of the work flows here so that we can investigate them deeper.

We would be really happy to hear from you to make Fireworks a better product. Please try to provide me with as much information as possible like the steps involved, which platform you are designing on. In case it is possible to share the fireworks png file, it will be even better.

If you don’t feel comfortable posting all these details here, you can mail me. Or you could post a message so that I can contact you offline. Any way of communication works for me till I am able to solve your problem.

Thanks once again for using Fireworks!

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Fireworks CS4 version has introduced defining the roundness of rectangles in either pixels or in percentage values. However in Fireworks CS3 the roundness could be defined only in percentage numbers.

In Fireworks CS4 if you are working with pixel values and a CS3 version file is opened, all the rectangles will loose the roundness information and have sharp corners.

To work around this just create a new rectangle and define the roundness in percentage and then open the CS3 version created fireworks png files. This will solve the issue.
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I have written some utility extensions for Fireworks which can all be accessed by clicking here.

Also I have written a couple of articles on Fireworks DevCenter. One of them is related to 9 slice functionality emphasizing on the tool itself which can be read here.

In case you need some extensions to be written or would like to discuss about a new one, I am open for a discussion.
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Fireworks CS4 now utilizes a new rendering engine. Users have the option of toggling between the CS3 and CS4 vector rendering engines using the following scripts: Any object created afresh in CS4 version will utilize the new rendering engine.

A legacy file created in version prior to CS4 even when edited in CS4 version will not use the newer engine until the object is selected and the script is run on it.

1. Download link for script to enable Fireworks CS3 vector rendering on selected objects
2. Download link for script to enable Fireworks CS4 vector rendering on selected objects

Users can toggle as many times between the 2 options to verify the graphic appearance.

Visual Illustration: See the 1 pixel anti-aliasing added to red rectangle on right which uses CS4 rendering.

The above editable fireworks png file can be downloaded from here.

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Bug fixes part 2 lists some more issues which have been ironed out in Fireworks CS4 release.

1. When objects are present in sub layers and the canvas image is resized, the sub layer objects do not get resized.
2. & character is now allowed in Symbol Properties dialog.
3. Layer in FW created in a PSD have the blend mode set to Pass Through now instead of Normal.
4. Exporting the slice from contextual menu was causing a hang of Fw.
5. Text with PS effects had a bigger bounding box. Now it is fixed.
6. Text object which had multiple attribute settings when copy pasted did not preserve the attributes when pasted. Now pasting the text object preserves the same.

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The Creative Suite 4 is being officially being launched in India. The launch events will be at the following cities. Send in your confirmations to the mail ID mentioned below to confirm your seats. It is a first come first served reservation.

Hope to see you at the launch events for ‘The Grand Unveil’

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