# Lightroom Classic / CC Functionality Timeline



## CloudedGenie (Oct 31, 2017)

I found this (historical) timeline on Adobe's site with the major functionality changes or additions to each of the different releases of Lightroom since the release of Lightroom 5:

New features | Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC

I was sure that Lightroom 6 / Lightroom CC as released in April 2015, immediately started to diverge in added functionality, with syncing with Lightroom Mobile only available to the CC version. However, my standalone LR6 offers to sync with my phone, but I do not see the dehazing functions, which I also know got added later.

And there had to be a link in nice big letters inviting you to learn about the all-new Lightroom CC


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## clee01l (Oct 31, 2017)

Any functionality added after Lightroom 6.0 was released is only available for those with a subscription.  Perpetual license holders only paid for the functionality in Lightroom 6.0.   The dehaze option is only available to those with a subscription.


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## tspear (Oct 31, 2017)

Somehow that list does not seem impressive.
And I know it is missing a lot of stuff which I have no use for. e.g. All the Lr mobile stuff.

Tim


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## tvi (Oct 31, 2017)

The dehaze function can be added to Lightroom 6 with one of the respective preset packages available on the web.


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## tspear (Oct 31, 2017)

tvi said:


> The dehaze function can be added to Lightroom 6 with one of the respective preset packages available on the web.


Technically you are violating the license. I think this was actually one of the reasons the perpetual license was discontinued.
Adding the license management for new functions adds a fair amount of code management.

Tim

Sent from my LG-TP260 using Tapatalk


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## Jim Wilde (Oct 31, 2017)

tspear said:


> Technically you are violating the license.



In what way? I don't think there's anything in the license T&Cs which says you can't download and use presets developed by a third party. Users have been doing that for as long as I can remember....some folks make their living by developing and selling presets.


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## tspear (Oct 31, 2017)

Jim Wilde said:


> In what way? I don't think there's anything in the license T&Cs which says you can't download and use presets developed by a third party. Users have been doing that for as long as I can remember....some folks make their living by developing and selling presets.


The dehaze function was not licensed in Lr6 perpetual. I recall reading in the license a reference to the product you were sold.
Using a preset to access a function for which you are not licensed.
Hence when people found a way around not having the dehaze slider on the screen. The cost to maintain two licenses models for Adobe went way up. 

Tim

Sent from my LG-TP260 using Tapatalk


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## Johan Elzenga (Oct 31, 2017)

tspear said:


> The dehaze function was not licensed in Lr6 perpetual. I recall reading in the license a reference to the product you were sold.
> Using a preset to access a function for which you are not licensed.
> Hence when people found a way around not having the dehaze slider on the screen. The cost to maintain two licenses models for Adobe went way up.



I doubt that very much. First of all, I don't see how the costs for Adobe went up just because Lr6 users could use a preset. And secondly, Dehaze is just one of the features that CC2015 users had and Lr6 users weren't supposed to have. Other features such as Boundary Warp and Guided Upright could not be accessed by a preset.


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## Jim Wilde (Oct 31, 2017)

I'm not sure the presets gives you access to the dehaze function, I thought they just mimic'd the same effect. So not a license violation if just using those presets.

I also don't see how that caused any additional costs for maintaining two license models. Those costs started with 6.0/CC2015.0, before the dehaze function was introduced.


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## johnbeardy (Oct 31, 2017)

I am pretty sure Tim is right about the technical breach of the licence, though I doubt it has any connection to the discontinuation of perpetual licences. Does an elephant worry about a pinprick on its backside?


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## johnbeardy (Oct 31, 2017)

Jim Wilde said:


> I'm not sure the presets gives you access to the dehaze function, I thought they just mimic'd the same effect. So not a license violation if just using those presets.



Jim, in the case of Dehaze, the presets did directly access the dehaze setting. You could even write a plugin with a slider and I did write one for my own interest. 

John


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## Johan Elzenga (Oct 31, 2017)

Jim Wilde said:


> I'm not sure the presets gives you access to the dehaze function, I thought they just mimic'd the same effect. So not a license violation if just using those presets.



No, they don't mimic it. It is the real Dehaze. The code is the same for both Lr6 and LrCC2015, and that is what they take advantage of.


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## tspear (Oct 31, 2017)

JohanElzenga said:


> I doubt that very much. First of all, I don't see how the costs for Adobe went up just because Lr6 users could use a preset. And secondly, Dehaze is just one of the features that CC2015 users had and Lr6 users weren't supposed to have. Other features such as Boundary Warp and Guided Upright could not be accessed by a preset.





Jim Wilde said:


> I'm not sure the presets gives you access to the dehaze function, I thought they just mimic'd the same effect. So not a license violation if just using those presets.
> 
> I also don't see how that caused any additional costs for maintaining two license models. Those costs started with 6.0/CC2015.0, before the dehaze function was introduced.



A few examples of the additional costs:
1. The project management to track all the calls to the license manager. Then deal with enable/disabling the calls when the major version number changes.
2. The UI design team, testing team, and code management to handle multiple differences in screens, logic, exception handling.
3. The code changes on release, branching, merging functionality. The more conditions you add to your code, the more complex it gets...
4. Increasing complexity makes it harder to test/manage
5. Think of ripple effect, you export a catalog from a CC machine, to a perpetual license machine. Should the guided uprights get applied? 
6. Consider presets. now you have to have additional exception processing in the import/export aspects for presets. These questions get repeated all over the place. 
7. Do you add license checks to the API system?

None of these issues are insurmountable. But each one has a cost, when people started to go around the very simplistic license block Adobe created just with the UI. Adobe had a few choices:
1. Absorb the costs on an ongoing basis
2. Discontinue one business model
3. Ignore people cheating the license

Likely for PR reasons, Adobe obviously chose to ignore the cheating on dehaze. They then ran into the costs with the vertical guides, and others. At which point, it hurt the business case for keeping both license models by increasing the costs to maintain both variations. 

And now, we know the result.

Tim


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## clee01l (Oct 31, 2017)

Jim Wilde said:


> I'm not sure the presets gives you access to the dehaze function, I thought they just mimic'd the same effect. So not a license violation if just using those presets.


The dehaze function can be coded as a develop preset instruction just like shadows or exposure. If present, LR applies the setting to the function. What LR6 did for perpetual license holders was to hide the dehaze user interface.  It did not block the function. The function is still active in the code. The perpetual license holder has no way to get to the function except by applying a develop preset.  I haven’t followed the changes since this first came out but there might be someone that wrote a plug-in to access the dehaze function through the API. If their plugin makes dehaze available to perpetual license holders, then they are the ones in violation of the license.


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## johnbeardy (Oct 31, 2017)

tspear said:


> Likely for PR reasons, Adobe obviously chose to ignore the cheating on dehaze. They then ran into the costs with the vertical guides, and others. At which point, it hurt the business case for keeping both license models by increasing the costs to maintain both variations.
> And now, we know the result.



Again, I doubt that. I'd suggest it's more of a case of there being no pressing reason to continue the exception for Lightroom, and maybe LR management are allowing themselves to believe LRCC is more than it is. Given the wider move to integrating around cloud services (eg LR-synced photos being directly accessible inside PS2018), I imagine the corporate line was "get with the programme".

John


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## Johan Elzenga (Oct 31, 2017)

I agree. Of course there are extra costs involved in keeping two versions. That is not under dispute. But I don't see how the existence of a couple of presets increases those costs. And I doubt even more that these presets had anything to do with the decision to terminate the perpetual licence.


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## tspear (Oct 31, 2017)

JohanElzenga said:


> I agree. Of course there are extra costs involved in keeping two versions. That is not under dispute. But I don't see how the existence of a couple of presets increases those costs. And I doubt even more that these presets had anything to do with the decision to terminate the perpetual licence.


Johan,

We are talking past each other. The presets told Adobe they could not take short cuts on the license management to separate the versions.

Tim

Sent from my LG-TP260 using Tapatalk


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## PhilBurton (Oct 31, 2017)

tspear said:


> A few examples of the additional costs:
> 1. The project management to track all the calls to the license manager. Then deal with enable/disabling the calls when the major version number changes.
> 2. The UI design team, testing team, and code management to handle multiple differences in screens, logic, exception handling.
> 3. The code changes on release, branching, merging functionality. The more conditions you add to your code, the more complex it gets...
> ...


I doubt that there were two separate code bases.  Just one code base with a license manager.  I was product manager once for a product with over 70 separate options, including usage levels.  E.g. 25, or 50, or 100, or 250, or unlimited usage of the main product.  Plus similar options levels for a few add-ons.  It can be done.

Phil


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## PhilBurton (Oct 31, 2017)

johnbeardy said:


> Again, I doubt that. I'd suggest it's more of a case of there being no pressing reason to continue the exception for Lightroom, and maybe LR management are allowing themselves to believe LRCC is more than it is. Given the wider move to integrating around cloud services (eg LR-synced photos being directly accessible inside PS2018), I imagine the corporate line was "get with the programme".
> 
> John


Exactly.


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## Johan Elzenga (Oct 31, 2017)

tspear said:


> We are talking past each other. The presets told Adobe they could not take short cuts on the license management to separate the versions.



And I think they couldn't care less. Every other new feature could not be used through presets, even though the code was available because there is no difference in code between LrCC2015.X and Lr6.X. If the two versions have proven anything, it is that they *can* take these short cuts. They have one application and the license manager takes care of the difference. Works perfectly. They have done so before, and they are still doing it right now: Camera Raw for Photoshop Elements is the same code as Camera Raw for Photoshop CC.


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## tspear (Oct 31, 2017)

Guys,

I never said it cannot be done. I said there is a cost to doing so. This additional cost plays into the business model.

Tim

Sent from my LG-TP260 using Tapatalk


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## Johan Elzenga (Oct 31, 2017)

Like I said: nobody disputes that having two versions costs more than having just one version. The only thing we disagree about is that this preset workaround has played a role in the decision to terminate the perpetual version. But as we both don't know for sure, we can continue this forever and that is what we should not do.


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## clee01l (Oct 31, 2017)

tspear said:


> I never said it cannot be done. I said there is a cost to doing so. This additional cost plays into the business model.


Actually there is not a cost associated.  The Dehaze User interface function checks a flag to see which license is running LR,  If a Subscription=true, the user interface displays, If false, then no user interface.  That same flag could have been included in the function that calls the develop adjustment for dehaze.  Apparently in LR6 it did not and the plugin or develop preset was able to take advantage of it.


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## tspear (Oct 31, 2017)

clee01l said:


> Actually there is not a cost associated.  The Dehaze User interface function checks a flag to see which license is running LR,  If a Subscription=true, the user interface displays, If false, then no user interface.  That same flag could have been included in the function that calls the develop adjustment for dehaze.  Apparently in LR6 it did not and the plugin or develop preset was able to take advantage of it.



The cost comes in the time to test if the widget displays or not. 
And writing the unit tests, and filing the bug report when it does not behave as expected....

Tim


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## CloudedGenie (Nov 1, 2017)

I installed LR6 from the downloaded installation file (at the moment 6.13 is the only version of Lightroom that I have installed), but it activated as LR2015.13 since I have a current subscription, rather than use the serial number. The Windows "uninstall" option shows the Adobe Lightroom version as 6.13. When selecting "Other Versions" under Lightroom Classic CC in the Adobe Creative Cloud App, it gives me the option to install CC(2015) and tells me that will remove the existing installation and any updates.

I created a new catalog file. Develop options did not show the Dehaze slider or the Transform panel (as I expected, since these were subscription only functions).

Then I read on the Adobe forums that LR6 would still be able to open *and edit* the LR2015 catalogs, even if they included Dehaze or Upright edits, you would just not be able to make further edits on those settings. I did not realize the catalog file would be backward compatible... which means I could use the latest version of LR2015 as my "base" catalog before importing into Lightroom Classic. I tested this by opening an existing LR2015 catalog, and was able to edit the Dehaze and Upright settings (these appeared when I opened the catalog).

Now, when I open my LR6 catalog, I still have Dehaze and Transform available...

Edit 20:46 EDT: Any idea how I can easily test the behaviour of a pure LR6 installation without losing one of my 2 serial number installation opportunities? I have access to another Windows 10 laptop without any Adobe products (a “virtual machine”)

Christelle


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## CloudedGenie (Oct 31, 2017)

I found this (historical) timeline on Adobe's site with the major functionality changes or additions to each of the different releases of Lightroom since the release of Lightroom 5:

New features | Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC

I was sure that Lightroom 6 / Lightroom CC as released in April 2015, immediately started to diverge in added functionality, with syncing with Lightroom Mobile only available to the CC version. However, my standalone LR6 offers to sync with my phone, but I do not see the dehazing functions, which I also know got added later.

And there had to be a link in nice big letters inviting you to learn about the all-new Lightroom CC


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## Hoggy (Nov 2, 2017)

...  A little late to the party, but...

As Cletus says, I also don't see how there would be any cost at all for one line of code that checks a flag about whether or not to show the feature in the interface (and that _is_ all that happens)..  Especially after the first instance had already been done.  There are simply not 2 separate versions of Lightroom 'Classic'.

Also, version 6.13 would show everything that had been done to an image using 2015.13.  I believe that was on purpose, so that someone with 2015.x could share an image with edits to a standalone 6.x user using the same '.x' number.

Yet more, if one were so inclined, they could even manually adjust the XMP to 'bypass' restrictions for the other non-dehaze functions as well.  Although doing so would be such a PITA to make it not worthwhile, unlike the simple global dehaze line/instuction.


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## clee01l (Nov 2, 2017)

Hoggy said:


> As Cletus says, I also don't see how there would be any cost at all for one line of code that checks a flag about whether or not to show the feature in the interface (and that _is_ all that happens)..


Most testing at large shops like Adobe is handled via automated testing scripts.  There are daily builds of the code and each build is automatically tested.  There is no incremental cost to Adobe to implement these code changes.
Top 10 Automated Software Testing Tools


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## tspear (Nov 2, 2017)

clee01l said:


> Most testing at large shops like Adobe is handled via automated testing scripts.  There are daily builds of the code and each build is automatically tested.  There is no incremental cost to Adobe to implement these code changes.
> Top 10 Automated Software Testing Tools



Been there, done that, and do that. 
For close to fifteen years, the company I co-founded ran a Navy contract. As part of the contract, about five years in, we were part of the pilot program to implement Activity Based Cost (ABC) accounting for Navy wide IT applications. The result was we had to track time used to maintain the code in the system, and allocate it to the funding activity. What was interesting was many minor change to the UI broke the automatation tools. The result was time spent updating to the testing scripts, and we had to allocate time to maintain the two versions of the test to handle the if statement mentioned above. 
Was it a lot of time? For incremental updates, no. For OS, development tools, and testing tools, it could add a lot of time; but these are less likely to happen in the Adobe case. Depending on the screen, complexity and other issues, it normally added 15 to 30 minutes to the regression testing. But it would hours to the test team for the first implementation, as they ran through all the scenarios of what applied or did not (granted, the license logic should be a lot simpler than a utility management system) and created multiple scripts or more complex data driven conditional scripts which could be run with multiple parameters. The result, as we built out and tested new functionality, each of those special cases added more time (and required separate funding). What was interesting was the business case for some of the funding activities dropped the special case requirements after a few years of paying the ongoing maintenance costs.

So, I will disagree that there is no incremental cost. Is it a lot, generally no for each little item. But it does add up.

Tim


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