What's new in SWITCH 07 - Configurators
An important part of SWITCH consists of configurators that drive third-party technology. Strengthening the existing configurators and providing new configurators was an important goal during the SWITCH 07 development cycle.
Adobe Creative Suite
The Adobe Creative Suite 3 applications were already supported in SWITCH 06, update 8; SWITCH 07 adds a number of additional possibilities:
All CS3 configurators (with the exception of Acrobat Distiller) now support job folders. Opening and processing a job folder needs to be done using custom scripts, but this makes it possible to process multiple input files using the configurator.
The print options in Adobe Acrobat have been extended and are now the same on Windows and Mac. The only difference between the two platforms is that the Mac only supports printing to the default printer, due to limitations in the Acrobat automation capabilities.
The InDesign configurator now also by default supports saving as PostScript and it can be instructed to fail those jobs that have unavailable fonts.
Allume Stuffit Deluxe
SWITCH 07 includes a configurator for Stuffit Deluxe 11 on Mac OS X and Windows. This allows the user to “unstuff” compressed archives using Stuffit Deluxe; creating new archives is not supported (but can be done instead through the standard compress tool).
AltSoft Xml2PDF
Altsoft Xml2PDF is a Microsoft .NET based family of server and desktop products for publishing various XML documents like XSL-FO, SVG, XHTML, WordML, DocX or XAML to print-ready output formats including PDF, PS, XPS and raster graphics (TIFF, GIF, JPEG, PNG, WMF).
SWITCH 07 includes support for the server versions of Xml2PDF.
Alwan ColorHub
Alwan ColorHub is an application from Alwan Color Expertise that drives its CMYK Optimizer and ICC Profile Processor technologies. These can be used to preflight and automatically and dynamically correct the color and ink weight characteristics of files.
SWITCH 07 includes an Alwan ColorHub configurator that allows the user to drive ColorHub queues to check and correct color management settings in processed files.
Axaio MadeToPrint
MadeToPrint is a range of plug-ins for enhancing and streamlining the output processes from within QuarkXPress and Adobe InDesign – including printing and creating PostScript, EPS or PDF files.
SWITCH 07 includes a configurator for the “auto” versions of MadeToPrint for QuarkXPress and Adobe InDesign.
Callas pdfaPilot
Callas pdfaPilot Validator and Converter are two tools that work with PDF/A; a PDF-based standard for archiving and document submission for corporations and governments.
SWITCH 07 includes a configurator for the CLI versions of these tools:
- callas pdfaPilot Validator CLI verifies whether a PDF file conforms to the PDF/A standard.
- callas pdfaPilot Converter CLI can also adjust an arbitrary PDF file (with some restrictions) so that it conforms to the PDF/A standard.
Callas pdfInspektor
Callas pdfInspektor has been supported by SWITCH since the beginning. SWITCH 07 adds full support for pdfInspektor4 (including its new features) but also extends the support for pdfInspektor3. Among the most important changes are:
- Support for the new XMLV2 and Inventory preflight report formats.
- More possibilities to fine-tune preflight reports. This includes being able to specify what information needs to be written to the report, how many errors need to be reported per page or document and more.
- Support for extra preflight report languages.
- Support for PDF/X and PDF/A conversion.
DevZeroG PrintSure CLI
DevZeroG delivers the preflight engine used in their web-based products as a standalone server version as well. This PrintSure CLI version is capable of preflighting and – if necessary – correcting PDF files against common standards or custom preflight profiles.
SWITCH 07 includes a configurator for DevZeroG PrintSure CLI.
Elpical Claro
Elpical Claro is an image processing application that performs automatic image enhancement based on the image content and the metadata associated with the image. Elpical provides a command-line edition of Claro that includes its core image processing technology.
SWITCH 07 includes a configurator for Elpical Claro, command-line edition.
Enfocus PitStop Server
Enfocus PitStop Server 3 and 4 were already supported by SWITCH 06. SWITCH 07 adds various improvements to the existing configurator. The most important changes are:
Support for script expressions to select an Action List. Previously script expressions were supported only to select the preflight profile used.
- Additional configuration possibilities for the Certified PDF support in PitStop Server.
- Additional color management options.
- The possibility to specify a private font folder for the configurator.
- Extra configuration possibilities for the generated preflight report.
PerfectProof ProofMaster
PerfectProof ProofMaster accepts a range of file formats (including PDF, PostScript, and TIFF, but also TIFF/IT and CT/LW) and drives a wide range of inkjet printers (from desktop models to large-format models).
SWITCH 07 includes a configurator that allows selecting a predefined ProofMaster queue. The configurator can wait until a proof has been approved and information about the proofing process can be attached to the output file (and subsequently used using scripting in PowerSWITCH). In addition, a proofed PDF, PostScript or EPS file can be exported from the configurator.
QuarkXpress
SWITCH 07 includes a configurator for QuarkXPress 7 on Mac OS X (the Windows version is not supported because it offers no automation interface SWITCH can use). Using the configurator a QuarkXPress file can automatically be opened, an AppleScript can be run on the file if needed and the file can be saved as QuarkXPress, PostScript or a set of EPS files.
Quite Imposing Hot
Quite Imposing Hot is a standalone PDF imposition tool from Quite Software. The standalone version offers similar functionality as the Quite Imposing (Plus) Adobe Acrobat plug-in.
SWITCH 07 includes a plug-in for Quite Imposing Hot.