InDesign Magazine has published my article Introducing Share for Review, for the July 2020 issue. I talk about the new Share for Review collaborative commenting feature, the latest in a long line of InDesign review workflows. What’s new or different about it?

The June 2020 release of Adobe InDesign adds Share for Review, a new workflow for collaborative feedback on InDesign documents. Share for Review is unlike other existing InDesign review workflows in that:

• It’s web-based, so your reviewers do not need to download any documents or applications. They simply click a link that opens in their web browser, with Acrobat-like reviewing tools.
• You don’t need to send, receive, manage, collate, or consolidate PDF files and their review comments, because the comments appear in the source InDesign document itself.
• Comments and replies appear for all reviewers as soon as they’re submitted. And you can update the review, so that reviewers can see how you implemented their comments. This short, friction-free feedback loop makes Share for Review more interactive than any other InDesign review workflow, short of being in a meeting with everyone at once.

In this way, it’s a step forward from even the recently introduced PDF Comments feature that I demonstrated during a session at CreativePro Week 2019.

But this first version of Share for Review is not yet ready for all review workflows, so I also cover many of its current limitations to help you decide whether it’s ready for you.

Note: On October 20, 2020, Adobe announced Creative Cloud 2021 applications including InDesign 2021 (version 16). In InDesign 2021, Share for Review now includes text annotation tools, which addresses a significant shortcoming in the version that I originally wrote about.

To read the article, click the link below to download it as a free PDF excerpt from the issue. (InDesign Magazine is published only in Portable Document Format.)

Introducing Share for Review (PDF)

Want to read the rest of the issue? You can buy it as a single issue or as a benefit of a paid InDesign Secrets premium membership, which may interest you if you want to advance your InDesign skills with the help of some of the most knowledgeable InDesign users in the industry.

InDesign Magazine is a bimonthly periodical devoted entirely to Adobe InDesign and to the thriving community of InDesign professionals. With editorial direction by page-layout guru and author David Blatner and CreativePro.com editor in chief Mike Rankin, InDesign Magazine brings you the in-depth features, reviews, and tutorials you need to master Adobe InDesign. You can download a free trial issue.

Want to know more about Share for Review? David Blatner and Anne-Marie Concepción discuss it in InDesign Secrets Podcast 276.