What About that Image Library Thingie?

WriteRAP provides a variety of tools and efficiencies to streamline the authoring process. One of these is the Image Library, and in this post we'll clarify what this tool is, what it does, and what it doesn't do.

The Image Library is a project-based repository on the WriteRAP server that can store jpegs or gifs for use within a WriteRAP document. It contains one folder for each chapter and a folder for common art for the project. These folders are autogenerated when a project is created or a document is added to a project.

The BatchXPort Pro extraction process automatically generates jpegs that can be uploaded to the Image Library by your vendor.

These images can be placed by the user using the Image Library button on the WriteRAP toolbar, although an online connection is required. An image placed using the image library will retain its name when the file is exported, whereas the native Word picture insertion mechanism will strip the name from the image file.

Do you need an Image Library?

Well, probably not. Other than this potentially useful image name in the export, WriteRAP offers conveniences, but an Image Library is not a required part of the WriteRAP process.

• It can offer the convenience of viewing art in pages, and significantly add to the visual environment. It could allow an author to provide low-resolution art to be placed by the vendor or development editor.
• Using a low-res image will allow editing of captions in context.
• For technical books and books relying on screen shots, the availability of the art can be crucial to the authoring/editing process.
• The author can mark broad changes to art within the WriteRAP manuscript. However, detailed art development is still probably best handled with a separate art manuscript.

Cautions:

• A lot of art will increase file size. There is still a risk of server error, document corruption and slow upload/download times if files become ungainly.
• For the foreseeable future, WriteRAP neither helps nor hurts art program management. It is not currently integrated with other systems, and the timing of manuscript development in WriteRAP often does not coincide with art program development.
• It is important to realize, also, that a vendor may place art without using the image library, and have other methods for getting art references into the XML code for paging.
• Some cost is incurred by using the Image Library.

Using the Image Library is a project-by-project decision, and one you should discuss with your team to determine if there is a potential benefit.

Word Tips 3

This set of Word tips focuses on working with tables.

Move a Row Within a Table

You've probably tried to move a row within a table in Word, and you've probably done it this way: add a row through the Table > Insert menu. Copy and paste the old row into its new location. Delete the old blank row. If that's how you've been doing this task, you'll be glad to know there is an easier way:

• Put your cursor in a cell of the row you want to move.
• Hold down the Alt-Shift keys (on Windows) or the Ctrl-Shift keys (on Mac) and use your up-down arrow keys to move the row.

Add a Line Before a Table

Anyone who has worked in Word knows that once you've started your document with a table, it seems impossible to get a line of text above that table. But there is a way:

• Put your cursor in a cell of the top row of the table.
• Hold down the Ctrl-Shift keys and press Enter (on Windows) or hold down the Option-Shift keys and press Return (on Mac).
• A line for text will appear above your table.

Split a Table

Once you have had two Word tables glued together, or if you decide to split a single Word table, how do you do it? Or have you decided it can't be done? It can, like this:

• Put your cursor in a cell of the row that you want to become the first line of the second table.
• Hold down the Ctrl-Shift keys and press Enter (on Windows) or hold down the Command (Apple)-Shift keys and press Return (on Mac).
• The table will split above your cursor..

Getting Ready for Pages

Get the most out paging from WriteRAP

Tiers 2-3: You have been using WriteRAP for structuring your content. Have your vendor ensure the styling in your content documents is correct to ensure good first pages in InDesign or Quark. Unlike keyboarded markup, you have an opportunity to see style errors visually and quickly and correct them before the compositor has to.

Tier 4: You are using WriteRAP for its structure and for a visual representation of first pages. You can take the structured content and go to first pages in InDesign, as above, but you can streamline your workflow by treating the WriteRAP file as first pages. Proofreading, editing and revisions can all be done in the MS Word environment! When the content is solid and as final as you can get in WriteRAP, you can finalize the chapter, move elements into their final position and make page breaks, or mark all of these for your vendor using comments or editorial notes.

The fewer content changes you have to make in composition, the smoother and quicker your composition passes will be. A quick proofreading pass to ensure the integrity of the content would take place, but the compositor can now focus on making good pages rather than correcting typos or sorting out a knot of marginalia on a single page. Remember that content changes in composition need to be made in the WriteRAP file as well, or logged for the next edition.

Tier 5: You are using WriteRAP and Word as the composition engine. You want to forget that Word is your composition engine as you go through the authoring-editing-proofreading-review cycle. Finalize your content in a template-driven, manuscript-like environment and then turn off Word's format protection and compose the pages when the content is final.

Because of the possibility of a slightly different representation in different versions or instances of Word, final review should be done in PDF format.

Vendor Refresh Training: Part 2

On the afternoon of Thursday, October 21st, we had the second installment of the refresher training. In that particular training session, the following vendors attended:

GEX

Progressive

Carlisle

Prepress

Juve

Element

It’s Time to Get Some Training! (Part Deux)

You may remember that last month, we talked about what to do when you needed to sign up for training. We’re pleased to announce that the new self-paced courses have been released both to the Pearson People Development Network, as well as into our Pegasus system (for external users such as authors or vendor contacts).

The courses have been revamped, rebuilt, and are more focused on specific skills used within WriteRAP. There are six new courses:

Getting Started – Getting Started focuses on logging in and out of WriteRAP and changing and recovering passwords.

Document Management – Document Management focuses on finding projects and documents, previewing documents, and uploading and downloading documents.

Toolbar Basics – Toolbar Basics focuses on opening a WriteRAP document and the toolbar, applying and removing character formatting, working with basic formatting, and applying and removing styles.

Boilerplates – Boilerplates focuses on downloading and opening the Boilerplates Library, inserting and editing boilerplates, working with common boilerplates, and cleaning up styles.

Basic Pagination – Basic Pagination focuses on repositioning boilerplates, resizing and deleting boilerplates, and breaks.

Advanced Pagination – Advanced Pagination focuses on finalizing pagination and the WriteRAP Library.

These courses are all self-paced, and include self-paced modules, job aids, a lab, and an assessment.

If you’ve already taken some training and are just looking for a little remediation, these course can provide that. You can also visit the CMS Website and peruse the Job Aids, which cover sets of skills for each course and can help you brush up on specific things as opposed to re-taking an entire training course.

Pearson People Development Network

Vendor Refresh Training: Part 1

This morning, we conducted the first vendor refresh training. Among the items we covered:

• Updates to the toolbar (Boxes macro, cleaning up Char styles, etc.)
• Updates to the interface (multiple document upload, packaging, etc.)
• Simplify templates so that they are usable
• Verify templates to the tagging guidelines
• Use of the QA checklist

The vendors at this refresh training were:

• Aptara
• Glyph International
• Integra
• Lapiz
• Laserwords
• MPS Limited
• PreMediaGlobal (PMG)
• S4Carlisle

Domestic vendors are scheduled for a similar session later this week.

We'll have an additional session later this week. The goal of this refresh training is to baseline all the vendors and Pearson in the knowledge we have to date for creating templates and working with WriteRAP projects.

We will follow up on these efforts with a monthly vendor forum to address any new issues, updates and questions that arise.

When the Toolbar and Boilerplates Don't Want to Load on the PC

We had an issue where a person was loading the WR toolbar for the first time on the PC, but was getting errors. Upon loading the WR toolbar off the website there was an error that opened a pop-up and then sent the toolbar document to the C: / Temp folder. All his office applications were turned off, as one is supposed to do. You could still activate the toolbar through Tools and Add-Ins, but this is merely a workaround that hides the issue and ultimately won't help.

Later they had a WR document open and wanted to load the boilerplates. We click Load boilerplates and get an error that is something like:

"Error #5 Invalid call or procedure"

...And no boilerplates load.

Here is more information on the computer with the problem: Windows running XP Pro version 5.1.2600, Service Pack 3.0

It turns out that these two errors are connected. Something was missing on their PC that most computers already have. The 0xc0000135 error ("The application failed to initialize properly") indicates that his .NET framework is bad or not installed at all. One should install Microsoft .NET Framework from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=0856eacb-4362-4b0d-8edd-aab15c5e04f5&displaylang=en> . One should install at least version 2.0.

This code should have been installed with Service Patch 2 years ago, but maybe it was missed on his machine. Every Windows machine needs to have .NET installed; there are just too many programs these days that depend on it and assume its presence.

Keep this in your bag of tricks should this happen to someone else.