Fix won't repair every issue with pen drivers and applications

Following reports of some application incompatibilities with the Surface Pro stylus -- including with several versions of Adobe Photoshop -- Microsoft is working on a fix for the issue. Electronista has learned that full support for pen issues may be left up to individual developers to fix, rather than a single solution for all applications affected by its implementation.

A statement from Microsoft regarding the issue says that "Surface Pro uses Windows Inbox Drivers and APIs (application programming interfaces) for the Surface pen, which support advanced features such as pressure sensitivity and eraser functionality. There are a number of apps in the Store that leverage these new Windows APIs and can take advantage of all that the Surface pen has to offer."

Regarding the Photoshop issues, Microsoft says that "the Surface pen does work with Photoshop, which runs on Surface Pro, though advanced features such as pressure sensitivity and eraser functionality may not be available at this time. Microsoft is working with the necessary partners to make advanced features of the Surface pen available across a number of applications in the near future."

Electronista spoke with highly-placed Microsoft support personnel who told us that "the fix as it stands won't fix everything, and doesn't address Photoshop. That will need to be fixed by Adobe." Our contact adds that "if application developers fully adhere to the Surface SDK implementation of pen functionality, then proper application support is all but guaranteed."

By Electronista Staff

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gadgets, Microsoft, Surface