UXP launch at Adobe MAX 2020 | Davide Barranca

The Adobe MAX 2020 conference is unfolding right now, free and online, carrying a number of major updates in the Creative Cloud apps lineup – Photoshop 2021 included. These are three of the major keynote’s highlights IMHO.

Conan O’Brien mentioning CEP 10 on stage

Read that again to sink it in.

Conan O'Brien on-stage at MAX 2020 — Conan O'Brien on stage co-hosting MAX 2020. He really said "CEP 10"

Adobe Photoshop 2021 supporting the new UXP plugins architecture for 3rd-party developers.

UXP stands for Unified Extensibility Platform, a technology that was Guinea-pigged on Adobe XD and “enables JavaScript-based plugin development with near-native performance”, quoting Ari Fuchs (Product Lead for in-app extensibility at Adobe).

The UXP architecture — The UXP Architecture (don't worry it'll be fine)

My fellow developer, if this doesn’t get you excited feel worried then: in the long run UXP is going to replace CEP, so you must care sooner or later. Let me stress that it will not happen overnight, we’re just in the early stages and they’re going to overlap for a significant amount of time. Yet, be aware that UXP is clearly the future of plugins development in Adobe-land for all major CC apps. Which apps?

The Creative Cloud Marketplace featuring UXP plugins Photoshop

We’ve been working behind the scenes for months now (“we” being yours truly and other amazing developers, with the invaluable support of Adobe employees) to build and launch our UXP plugins in time for MAX 2020. I’ve released new versions of ALCE, Double USM (that for a limited time are 50% off the original price), and the free utilities Theme Switcher and Floating Adjustments.

The hub for plugins discovery and installation is now the CCD – Creative Cloud Desktop app – read more on this post by Vijay Vachani, (Sr. Director Product Management & Platform Partnerships at Adobe). Photoshop 2021 also sports a new Plugins menu and panel.

UXP and you – how this blog can help 🚀

In the past, I’ve extensively blogged about CEP in the apparently quite popular “HTML Panels Tip” series. I plan to do the very same here with UXP – with the difference that I’m also going to record videos: the first being an extensive introduction/first-aid to the UXP platform that I’ll release here before the end of the month. So stay tuned! And let me know what you think in the comment below.

This is a collection of the available UXP resources at the moment:

In the meantime, there are a number of freely available Adobe MAX sessions to watch and learn from – check them out. Stay safe and cheers from Italy! 🖐

Davide