FTP is a company with a long tradition as a provider of Internet based connectivity for the Microsoft DOS and Windows desktop. The Web has made the Internet and related technologies a medium for publishing, accessing and delivering information.
As the Web matures as a globally reaching transport medium for all types of content: text, image, audio, video, etc., there will be a natural increased emphasis on quality. Since our culture has not yet left the “paper” stage, and probably never will, one important observation is that when people find information of importance, we most often create a hard copy version for archiving and for off-line studying.
Currently the quality of printed matter generated from Web pages is of much lower quality than when the same information is viewed through the browser. To reach a next level of acceptance, as a platform for business, the Web applications must be able to print the content at a quality equal or higher than the online viewing device. Medium to high resolution color hard copy devices are coming down in price, everyone can afford one. Therefore the market will be demanding this.
FTP’s direction with Web based products is becoming more and more content oriented. One of the areas that matter to our customers is therefore the ability to print high quality versions of the information accessed over the Web.
My professional background includes eight years of developing high end publishing and imaging technology, including the first WYSIWYG workstation for full size newspaper page composition. The main thrust in these projects were resolution independent text, typography, graphics and images. I therefore have a very strong interest in this topic.