Printing fields as first record in the pdf proof

OL Connect Enterprise
1

Hi, we have a requirement to markup with a highlighter pen all the data fields on the imposed PDF proof that are variable for the digital print department. This is so they can cross-reference double-sided data jobs against the customer proof and the imposed proof.

It is easy for us to markup on single one off jobs, but now we have a number of jobs in the workflow, it is hard to know/remember every job’s data makeup and placement from looking at the PDF workflow output proofs.

My question; is there a way to print out the first record with the variable fields as named in the data mapper or even highlighted to show what is variable and what is not?

2

A quick and dirty way of doing this would be to select all you scripts and disable them, then do a proof-print for record 1. With the scripts disabled, no replacing of the @field@ tokens will take place, so they will show up as-is on the page.

3

Thanks for getting back to me Phil, that is handy for one off jobs but what we are wanting is for it to be setup within our workflow as we just drop data/csv’s into them and then send the pdf outputs to digital.

Probably a difficult task but wondered if it’s possible?

4

Well I gave it a shot! But I’m not the most savvy when it comes to advanced features in the Designer so I will let one of my esteemed (and expert) colleagues take a stab at this question.

5

It is appreciated Phil and thanks again the Forum is an excellent knowledge based community and a great source of information!

:ok_hand::+1:

2 Likes
6

This is not possible out of the box, but believe you can get close with some preparation. Perhaps not very elegant and it requires a dummy record, but let me share what I did.

  1. I assigned all variable elements in the template a CSS class name (for example .ol-scripted)
  2. Added a script that dynamically appends a stylesheet rule to the template for the first record. This rule adds a border and background color to the respective elements.

Attached my sample file.

Erik

Note on step 2! There are various ways to dynamically trigger the styling but I felt this one is the easiest to add to your document.

bundle-offers-2021-1.OL-template (448.2 KB)

The script:

if( 1 === record.index ) {
	results.append( "<style>.ol-scripted { outline: 1px solid rgba(255, 235, 59, 1); background: rgba(255, 235, 59, 0.5); }</style>" );
}

image
image1620×732 101 KB

7

Would be nice if a Control script could disable all scripts in the Standard folder and include the highlighting you have done. This will show all the @data@ highlighted in a duplicated first record for instance. In your template, if fields are empty then it is not obvious if a field is meant to be there. But I guess to fix that one could use the post function to populate empty fields. Great idea though.

screen
screen851×147 10 KB

8

Hi Erik thanks for this script, it is partly what we need, the Highlighted part that is!

Is it possible to duplicate the first record so the output is:

Record 1 - Highlighted
Duplicate of Record 1 - Not Highlighted

regards,

Russ

9

Russ,

Not sure if that’s what you’re looking for but since version 2021.1, the DataMapper can not only create duplicate copies of each record but it can also store different information in each copy, allowing you to conditionally format the record in the designer.

For instance, at the end of your data mapping config, you could add a script similar to this one:

if(record.index===1){
  record.copies = 2;
  record.setCopy(0, {ExtraData:"Very first!!!"})
};

This script duplicates the very first record, and in the first copy of that duplicated record, it stores a value in the ExtraData field. Then in the Designer, you can check the value in that field and conditionally format the record accordingly.

You can read more about the setCopy() method here. Pay particular attention to the Note section near the top of the page.