CorelDRAW was originally developed for Microsoft Windows but a Macintosh version was released some years later.

CorelDRAW came into its own with Microsoft’s release of Windows 3.1. Although a 16-bit application, the inclusion of TrueType in Windows 3.1 transformed CorelDRAW into a serious illustration program capable of quality typography.

At one time, a Linux version of CorelDRAW was available, but it was subsequently discontinued. The latest version 12 is available for Windows only.

In 1984, Dr. Michael Cowpland founded Corel and hired software engineers Michel Boullion and Pat Beirne to develop a vector-based illustration program (1987 start, 1989 release) to bundle with the Intel-based desktop publishing (DTP) systems Corel was selling. The program was well received and Corel soon focused on software alone.

Several innovations to vector-based illustration originated with CorelDRAW: a node-edit tool that operates differently on different objects, fit text-to-path, stroke-before-fill, quick fill/stroke color selection palettes, perspective projections and complex gradient fills. Corel also pioneered the inclusion of a large range of fonts and clip-art with the package.

Around the same time, as additional components were developed and acquired (Corel Trace, Corel Texture, Corel Photo-Paint, etc.) CorelDRAW was marketed as a graphics software suite.

Features

Although primarily designed to edit images for paper-based printing, Photoshop is used increasingly to produce images for the World Wide Web. Recent versions bundle a related application, Adobe ImageReady, to provide a more specialized set of tools for this purpose.

Photoshop also has strong links with software for media editing, animation and authoring. It works with Adobe ImageReady, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Premiere, Adobe After Effects & Adobe Encore DVD to make professional standard DVDs, provide non-linear editing and special effects services such as backgrounds, textures and so on for television, film and the web. Photoshop’s native file format (PSD or PDD) can be exported to and from Adobe ImageReady, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Premiere, After Effects and Adobe Encore DVD. Photoshop CS broadly supports making menus and buttons for DVDs. For PSD or PDD files exported as a menu or button, it only needs to have layers, nested in layer sets with a cueing format and Adobe Encore DVD reads them as buttons or menus.

PSD or PDD is a widely accepted file format. Competing bitmap image editing programs (such as Macromedia Fireworks, Corel Photo-Paint, Pixel32, WinImages, GIMP, Jasc Paintshop Pro etc.) can import and edit layered PSD or PDD files.

Photoshop can deal with a number of different color spaces:

sRGB color space (white point=D65) - “RGB” in photoshop
Lab color space (white point=D50) - “Lab” in photoshop
CMYK color model
Grayscale

The most recent version, as of 2005, is version 9. This iteration of the program is marketed as “Photoshop CS2″. “CS” reflects its integration with “Adobe’s Creative Suite” and a number “2″ because it is the second version released since Adobe rebranded their products under the CS umbrella. In an effort to break away from previous versions of the application and to reinforce its belonging with the new line of products, Photoshop even dropped one classic graphic feature from its packaging: the Photoshop eye, which was present in different manifestations from versions 3 to 7. Photoshop CS versions now use feathers as a form of identification.

The latest version comes with Adobe Camera RAW, a plugin developed by Thomas Knoll which can read several RAW file formats from various digital cameras and import them directly into Photoshop. A preliminary version of the RAW plugin was also available for Photoshop 7.0.1 as a $99 USD optional purchase.

While Photoshop is the industry standard image editing program for professional raster graphics, and practically monopolises the high-end market, its price has led to a number of competing graphics tools gaining market share in the low-end and mid-range markets; some, such as the GIMP, are completely free. To compete in this market, and to counter unusually high rates of piracy of their professional products, Adobe have introduced a low-end program called Photoshop Elements, which is a cut-down Photoshop with many professional features removed, for under $100 US; this is aimed firmly at the consumer market, since the feature cuts make it unsuitable for prepress work.