PrintShop Mail
Once you have imported PrintShop Mail documents (see
Import Documents) to your PlanetPress Workflow workstation, you can use PrintShop Mail action tasks to output the job file with a selected PrintShop Mail document. PrintShop Mail action tasks let you print as well as generate PostScript or PDF files. The PrintShop Mail and PrintShop Mail 7 action tasks are essentially the same except for the version supported: PrintShop Mail only supports 6.1 documents, while PrintShop Mail 7 supports 7.0 and 7.1 documents.
Limitations
In order for the PrintShop Mail tasks to be functional, some pre-requisites must be met:
- PrintShop Mail version 6.1 or higher must be installed on the same system, and an activated PrintShop Mail production dongle must be plugged in to the system.
- You must have at least one printer using a PostScript driver on your system in order to produce PDF output. It is highly recommended that a PostScript printer be set as the default system printer in order to act as a fall back if the selected printer is unreachable.
- PlanetPress Workflow Service must be configured with a username and password that have access to the required printer(s). The Local System Account setting will not work.
Input
A data file compatible with a PrintShop Mail Document. This is not the same as a data file compatible with PlanetPress Design. For example, Excel spreadsheets (XLS files) are useable in PrintShop Mail, but not in PlanetPress. Metadata is ignored by this task.
Processing
The data file is merged with the selected PrintShop Mail Design document, producing the number of records selected in the task properties. This merging uses the PrintShop Mail engine (PSMail.exe), not the PlanetPress Alambic engine, to generate the output.
Output
The output produced by this task is dependent on the options selected, it can be PDF, a Windows EMF print job, a PostScript print job or a JPG file. Note that Preflight doesn't actually produce printable or viewable output. The Preflight option does a cursory verification of the job and will generate an XML file that contains a list of all warnings and errors, including on which record and layout the warning or error occurred, and a description.
Task Properties
PSMail tab
- File name: Select a specific PrintShop Mail document if you want all the jobs to be printed with that document.
- Output type group
- Output type: Select the type of output you want the task to generate.
- Select PDF to generate a PDF file.
- Select Windows PostScript driver to print to a PostScript printer available via Windows.
- Select Preflight to check if the merging of the data file and document would generate warnings or errors. This does not actually produce output, only an XML file containing a list of warnings and errors.
- Select Produce PostScript to generate a standard PostScript file that can then be sent to any PostScript printer.
- Select JPG to generate a JPG image file.
- Data file type: Select the data file type that is sent to this task, and used as a database for the PrintShop Mail document.
- Distilling options file: Enter the name and path of a distilling options file (or "joboptions" file) or use the Browse button to navigate to that file. This option is only available when PDF is selected in the Output type box.
- PDF Type: Select Preview or Print to select which type of PDF should be generated. This option is only available when PDF is selected in the Output type box.
- PostScript Driver: Select which driver to use to generate the job. This should be the same as the printer selected in your PrintShop Mail document when designing it. This option only appears in the PDF and Produce PostScript output types.
- Windows printer: Select the print driver of the printer to which you want the print job to be sent. This option is only available when Windows PostScript driver is selected in the Output type box.
- Print Technology: Select the PrintShop Mail print technology to use when generating the output. For a list of available job technologies, consult the PrintShop Mail User Guide. This option is only available when Windows PostScript driver is selected in the Output type box.
- Layout: Select which layout to use to produce the JPG file (output is limited to a single image). This option is only available when JPG is selected in the Output type box.
- User generated file as output: The output from the plugin will be the file generated by the merging (depending on the output type selected). This option is not available in the Windows PostScript Driver output type.
- User original data as output: The output from the plugin will be original data file. When this option is selected, a box is enabled under the option, letting you specify a full path where the output should be saved. This option is not available in the Windows PostScript Driver output type.
- Record Range group
- All records: Select if you want to print all the records included in the job file.
- Use Record Range: Select if you want to print only some of the range included in the job file. Use the From and To boxes to indicate the record range.
On Error Tab
By default, any action task, branch, splitter or condition that generates an error will simply be ignored, and the task just under it (not within a branch) will be given control of the job file without any modification. Any initial input task that generates an error will stop the process from running as a whole, and output tasks will not generate output. The On Error tab can be used to overwrite the default behaviors.
- Send to Process: Check this option to send the job file to an error management process.
- Error Process drop-down: Enabled only when the Send to Process option is checked. Lists any process of which the initial input task is the Input Error Bin task.
- Action Group: This group is disabled in the initial input tasks and defaults to Stop Process. In all other tasks where the On Error tab is present, the following options are available:
- Ignore: The task is ignored as if it did not exist, and the job file is passed on to the next task in the process.
- Stop Branch: If the task is in a branch of the process, the branch is stopped and the job file is returned to the process after the branch. The branch will not produce any output.
- Stop Process: The process is stopped and no more processing is done. No further output is produced.
- Log Message: Check this option to enable logging a custom error message in the PlanetPress Suite Workflow Tools' log file.
- Message: Enabled only when the Log Message option is checked. Enter a message that will be logged in the PlanetPress Suite Workflow Tools' log file. You can use any variables available in PlanetPress Workflow to customize the message.
- Store the message in variable: Select in which jobinfo, local or global variable you want to store the message content.
- ID: Enter an error ID. This ID will be visible in the Windows Event Viewer. However, the ID is not visible in the PlanetPress Suite Workflow Tools' log file.
- Store the ID in variable: Select in which jobinfo, local or global variable you want to store the error ID.
- Reset to defaults: Resets all options in this tab to their default values.
If storing the message or ID, if they are store in a jobinfo they will be available in any error handling process where errors are being forwarded. In all cases, if your process continues after the error, the contents of the variables selected in this window will be available for the rest of your process, or whenever they are overwritten.
Common Errors
Though some error messages are specific to a task in particular, others may apply to any and all tasks because they are related more to the system than to PlanetPress itself. Some examples would be W3813, W3830, W3991, W4005. These correspond to issues such as not having any space to write files, permission errors on folders or files, etc.
Comments Tab
The Comments tab, added in PlanetPress Suite 7.5, is common to all tasks. It contains a single text area (Task comments) that lets you write comments about the task. These comments are saved when the dialog is closed with the OK button, and are displayed in The Task Comments Pane.