OL ConnectRelease Notes 2020.2.1

License Update Required for Upgrade to Connect 2020.x

From OL Connect 2019.1 onwards, only customers with a current OL Care subscription will be able to update Connect.

Every Connect license now contains an end date that represents the last day of OL Care coverage for each customer. Upgrades and updates of Connect will be freely available up until that end date, but will not be available thereafter, unless the OL Care period is extended.

This new licensing model requires anyone upgrading to 2020.2 from Connect versions earlier than 2019.1 to first update their OL Connect License.

A dialog box appears as part of the Connect upgrade process requesting you to do this.

It is heavily recommended that you first update the OL Update Manager, as newer versions of the Update Manager can update your OL License to the required version, then install Connect 2020.2.

For further details on how to upgrade the Update Client and update your Connect License see the Update Manager 1.3 - Upgrade Guide.

If issues arise, or if you need to renew your OL Care subscription, please contact your local Customer Care group.

Backup before Upgrading

It is recommended that you always backup your existing OL Connect preferences before upgrading to a new version. This will enable you to revert back to the previous version, in a worst case scenario in which the new version introduces issues with your existing production processes. Whilst the probability of such a worst case scenario is remote, it cannot hurt to take some simple precautions, just in case.

For instructions on how to do so, please see Backup existing OL Connect version.

Overview

This document provides an overview of the new features and enhancements in OL Connect 2020.2, as well as some important installation information.

Installing OL Connect 2020.2

  • OL Connect is released as a 64 Bit version only.
  • Full details on installing and licensing OL Connect can be found in the online help, which can be accessed from the software and the installer.
  • Note that the software comes with a 30 day trial license by default.

Connect installation requires Administrator rights

Please note that the OL Connect installation can only be run by users who have Administrator rights.

OL Connect 2020.2.1 Enhancements

Fixed Connect 2020.2 Installation error

An installer issue that prevented Connect 2020.2 from installing on Hyper-V (and some other virtual environments other than VMware) has been fixed. (SHARED-79958)

Fixed Connect 2020.2 uninstallation error

It was discovered that the Connect 2020.2 Designer would not fully clean up temporary folders when the Table Wizard was used. This would lead to "Failed to uninstall" error messages during uninstallation, even though Connect would uninstall successfully. This issue has been fixed in Connect 2020.2.1. (SHARED-79922/79765)

Fixed issue with script references to BackgroundResource.RESOURCE_PDF

An issue was introduced in Connect 2020.2 whereby script references to BackgroundResource.RESOURCE_PDF would produce errors. This has been fixed in 2020.2.1. (SHARED-79927)

OL Connect 2020.2 Enhancements

OL Connect Security Improvements

  • Security of the Weaver engine has been improved. (SHARED-74605)
    Important note for those running an Enhance config in which a JavaScript uses Java classes. JavaScripts evaluated by the Weaver engine no longer have access to the Java API by default. In order for such an Enhance config to run, any necessary Java classes must be whitelisted. For further details, please see Output creation fails when Enhance configuration accesses the Java API in the OL Connect Workflow Help.
  • Multiple OL Connect dependencies updated. (SHARED-76431)
  • Improved support for encrypted email output (TLS/SSL). (SHARED-76460)

Print Manager Improvements

  • Deleted printers were not cleared from the system and they could not be reintroduced. This has been fixed. (SHARED-41939)
  • Standalone Print Manager installation now installs the Software Activation Tool. (SHARED-70967)
  • Applying a job history limit will now take immediate effect. (SHARED-77071)
  • Multi-job mode is the recommended setting for IPDS and it has now been made the default. (SHARED-77176)

General Improvements

  • Cleaned up the error messages returned by Connect Server. Messages will no longer be duplicated, and they will not have exception class prefixes, such as "ApplicationException:". (SHARED-70963)
  • Improved Server side error handling when a template fails to load. As part of this improvement we also now log the template name when a template is loaded. (SHARED-71024)

Installer Improvements

  • Add a feature to the silent installer of Connect to allow specifying a target folder other than the default folder, using "install.directory=xxx". (SHARED-75669)
  • Silent installations can now specify connecting to a database with an encrypted connection, using "database.usessl". (SHARED-75671)
  • Silent installations no longer need a connection to a database to complete. (SHARED-75775)
  • In the Connect installer, the Messenger Service is now only installed when the Designer module is selected. (SHARED-76189/76318)
  • Improvements made for installations on machines where Connect failed to uninstall correctly. (SHARED-77148)

Connect 2020.2 Designer Improvements

Improved Background Image options

  • The Section Background functionality has been updated to support image types other than PDF. This includes .png, .jpg and .tiff (including multi-page TIFFs) files. This is also supported via the Control Script API.(SHARED-72730)
  • In versions of Connect prior to 2020.2, if a page had no content except for a linked DataMapper background, then Connect would consider it an "empty" page when determining whether or not to "Omit Master Page Back in case of an empty back page" (available as an option in the sheet configuration of a section). This has now been fixed in Connect 2020.2, and such pages are no longer considered empty. (SHARED-72588)
    This can affect the output of existing templates.

Scripting Improvements

  • Added ability to quickly search through script names and contents for specified text. (SHARED-60305)
  • Auto suggestion improvements made for table properties in the JavaScript editor. (SHARED-70690)
  • Introduced prev() and next() functions to the "results" object in our scripting API. (SHARED-70764)
  • Fixed a problem with Find Previous in the script debugger. (SHARED-76737)
  • Fixed minor issues in the script folder properties dialog. (SHARED-76996)
  • Added the ability to retrieve the size of a print section or medium in any script, and the ability to change the size in a control script. (SHARED-77446)
  • Fixed results.add() functionality. (SHARED-78447)

General Designer Improvements

  • When the size of a print section is changed, you can now choose to "Update linked media" if the media is only used by that section. If it is not, then the option will not be available. (SHARED-65278)
  • Holding shift while dragging boxes now drags the box in either horizontal or vertical directions. (SHARED-72158)
  • Fixed failures with the 'Get Job Data File on Submit' feature. (SHARED-72697)
  • Fixed an issue with the Export Report function skipping Web information for some templates. (SHARED-73640)
  • Apply button added to Section Properties Dialogs, which allows applying changes without closing the dialog. Clicking the Cancel button reverts any previously applied changes. (SHARED-74164)
  • Fixed an issue with broken PDF hyperlinks that would occur when not all child elements of a hyperlink were on the same page. (SHARED-74482)
  • Fixed some issues in the formatting dialog. (SHARED-74908)
  • The case sensitive option of Conditional Scripts is now also available for HTML String fields. (SHARED-74970)
  • Added support for multi-selections to the Make Conditional feature. (SHARED-76443)
  • A change introduced in 2019.2 disallowed the selection of multiple elements in the Outline tree in Designer. This has now been remedied. (SHARED-76550)
  • Fixed issue with Save As... option sometimes being disabled. (SHARED-76740)
  • Fixed an issue whereby inserting a Table into a snippet would not mark that snippet as changed. (SHARED-76875)
  • Introduced a new preference to control the behaviour when dragging data fields to the main editor. By default, scripts now use a class selector. (SHARED-76934)
  • Fixed an issue where pagebreaks on the same page were ignored when a pagebreak was applied to the last row of a table. (SHARED-77946)
  • Fixed an issue whereby some dates in JSON data would not resolve correctly in the Designer. (SHARED-78218)

Connect 2020.2 Output Improvements

2D Vector Barcode optimization

2D Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) barcodes now optimized. (SHARED-77579)

This optimization includes these barcode types:

  • Aztec Code
  • DataMatrix
  • QR Code
  • Variations of the above, such as GS1 DataMatrix

True Type font handling

A major overhaul of TrueType font handling in the Connect output engine was conducted. This should help in reducing errors relating to both caching and parallel processing. (SHARED-61839)

PDF Digital Signature Improvements

  • When creating a digitally signed PDF that includes a timestamp acquired from a timestamp server, Connect now automatically chooses the hash algorithm for the timestamp request.
    SHA-256 is tried first and if the timestamp server does not support it, Connect then tries SHA-384, SHA-512 or SHA-1 (in that order), defaulting to SHA-256 if none are supported. (SHARED-77850/78085)
  • Fixed an issue whereby the use of certain certificates would result in incorrectly signed PDF output. (SHARED-77915)

PDF Output Improvements

The PDF Output options have been substantially improved. This required a redesign of the PDF Options page, to provide all the new options on a single Wizard page. The various options have now been placed in logically distinct tabs.

The improvements include the following:

  • New image optimization options added for down-sampling mono, greyscale, and color images. (SHARED-75219)
    This includes a new option to "Optimize for Fast Web View". (SHARED-75210)
  • Added PDF Security options. (SHARED-75213/75216)
    The Security options mirror those available in Adobe PDF applications.
  • Improved support for processing digitally signed PDF/A-3 attachments. (SHARED-77267/78255)
    You can now choose to Keep attachments and whether to retain PDF/A-3 extension schema metadata, in order to support production of digitally signed PDF/A-3 using that metadata.

Print Output Improvements

  • Fixed issues with missing glyphs and space characters in some double-byte jobs. (SHARED-74531)
  • Placeholders for missing glyphs are now output as black, allowing output to remain monochrome. (SHARED-75513)
  • Fixed issues with large double-byte font jobs. (SHARED-76730)
  • The upper limit for the Separation by Count setting in the Separation Options Page has been increased to 10,000,000. (SHARED-77375)
  • Optimized line drawing commands to reduce size of AFPDS output. (SHARED-77622)
  • Update and improve image support in AFP, PCL and IPDS output. (SHARED-77716/77967/77972/77993)
  • Added support for Overlays (these will be scaled to the needed size) to AFP output. (SHARED-77768)
  • Pattern support setup code modified in PostScript output, so it will no longer interfere with custom Page Device setup from printer definitions.
  • Fixed a license watermark issue in PostScript output with pages containing negative font size text. (SHARED-78076)
  • Increased the limit of both Black and White thresholds to 50% for those print output types that support it. (SHARED-78298)

Email Output Improvements

  • Improved error messaging for emails containing PDF attachments containing hyperlink images. (SHARED-76540)

Known Issues

As of OL Connect 2018.1 the Known Issues have moved from the Release Notes to the Connect online Help.

They can be found here Known Issues.