PaginateThis!

A set of solutions for placing content stored on the Web directly into pagination systems.

	Project to be hosted on SourceForge and licensed under Creative Commons GNU GPL.

Platforms we aim to support

• Adobe Indesign (Mac and Windows)
• Quark XPress (Mac and Windows)
• Others?

What it does

• Content Providers place "Pagination-Ready" Content up on their webservers
  • "TaggedText" for Adobe InDesign
  • "XPress Tags" for Quark XPress
• Content User launches Pagination System to the page where they want this Content to load.
• Content User launches Web Browser, surfs to Content Provider's website, and clicks on a link for a piece of Content
• The Pagination Application automatically comes back into focus, and the Content is ready to place on the open page

How it works

• Content Providers assign a particular "mime-type" to the Content.
  • For example, InDesign's TaggedText files get "application/x-tt" and should end with a ".tt" file extension
• User associates that mime-type & file extension with a script on their computer
• That script parlays the downloaded file over to the Pagination System's "Place..." feature
• Formatted Content shows up on the currently open page in the Pagination System

Design Decisions

• For the first build of PaginateThis!, we've decided to facilitate transfer of formatting languages such as TaggedText and XPress Tags, rather than the transfer of XML.
• This is because downloading of formatted files (and their accompanying style definitions) seems far easier for your average Pagination System user to configure and adjust
• It is anticipated that transformation processes on the backend can do far more "heavy lifting" in terms of transforming content-centric XML into pagination-ready formatted files
• Content Providers looking to serve, say, TaggedText files can also distribute "starter style definitions," embedded in a default .indd file (Adobe InDesign's native page format.) Content Users can then adjust these style definitions as they see fit.

Current Downloads

• PaginateThis4ID -- for Mac OSX -- ver. 0.1
  • Download PaginateThis4ID-source.zip Source Code
  • Compile the source code into a Droplet:
    1. Double-click on "PaginateThis4ID.applescript".
       • This should launch Script Editor and InDesign.
       • You will be working in Script Editor.
       • Leave InDesign open for later testing.
    2. Use the "Save As.." command under Script Editor's File menu to save PaginateThis4ID.applescript as an application.
       • You must choose "Application" as the File Format.
    3. Close Script Editor.
       • To test the droplet you've just created, find a tagged text file and drop it on PaginateThis4ID.
       • This should place the file into an InDesign page.
       • Optionally, you create an alias on your Desktop to the Droplet. Then, you can drag local TaggedText files onto the Droplet icon.
    4. Now click on the link to this sample Tagged Text file.
       • When your browser asks what to with the file, tell it to open with PaginateThis4ID.
       • From now on, all files with this mime-type in the header will automatically be placed in your currently opened InDesign page.
       • [Note: tested with Firefox 1.5 only.]
  • Credit for this build goes to RogueSheep.
  • Improvements we hope to make to this utility:
    • Make it so that clicking a link merely loads the InDesign "Place Gun," allowing the InDesign user to then draw the outline of the text box which shall house the content. Or, alternatively, allow the InDesign user to click the Place Gun on a pre-existing text box, thereby appending the new content to the content that's already there.
    • Get it working for users of Safari and Internet Explorer on the Mac.
    • Allow for an easily distributable Droplet binary, requiring no further compilation, if possible.

Project Sponsored By:

Want More Info?

Email alan (at) xmlteam [dot] com