Toggle Imposition in When Composing

[DaveYeag]

I'm just wondering if the there is an OnRecordStart command to disable the imposition.  I'm already outputting separate PDFs based on the job number, but sometimes they don't need to be imposed and I'd like to eliminate the extra step of cropping those oddballs out of an imposed sheet.

[Douglas Cogan]

So, you want some records imposed and some not imposed, intermingled in the same output PDF?

No, there is no way to do that. I'm trying to think how it would work if the imposition were stacking. Would you just intermingle pages that are single record pages next to imposed sheets in the same output PDF?

What you could do is run it twice,and one time skip all the records that should be imposed and run it again and skip all the records that are not to be imposed and turn off imposition in between.

[DaveYeag]

They would not be intermingled in one PDF since every record is a unique PDF.  This process is being used to output 25up sheets of Business cards, 1 record (Name), per PDF.  What's happening in our new normal of WFH is people are asking for digital business cards.  So for those orders I'm trying to come up with a way for the operator to run the normal process but for those 'Digital' orders to output a PDF without the imposition.  Currently the are running an extra step with Quite Imposing to crop those output files down.

[Dan Korn]

13 minutes ago, DaveYeag said:

I'm trying to come up with a way for the operator to run the normal process but for those 'Digital' orders to output a PDF without the imposition.

What is this normal process?  How is it accomplished?  Is it done manually in FP Creator (in Acrobat), by someone hitting the Compose button on the Composition Settings dialog?  Or is it an automated process via FusionPro Server?

If it's done manually in Acrobat, then you can simply uncheck the "Use Imposition Definition" box.

If it's an automated composition with FP Server, then you can disable imposition by adding the line "UseImpositionDefFile=No" at the end of the CFG file, or by setting the property CompositionRequest.Options.UseImposition = false in the object passed to the CreateCompositionSession function in the API.  I would think that whatever file or setting that you're trying to use to key off of to set something in a JavaScript rule in the job could also be accessed to accomplish either of those programatically.

[Douglas Cogan]

@Dan Korn, the issue is, if I'm understanding this, is that each record is to its own PDF but they want some records imposed and some records not imposed. 

Is that correct?

 

[DaveYeag]

Douglas is correct.

We are using FP Creator in Acrobat.  Orders get compiled in a database and every couple of days the operators just click a button to output a data file, then open up the business card template and hit compose.  Easy, peasy.  There is already an OnRecordStart rule which creates a new PDF file (using the imposition) when the job number changes (which is every record).  Each PDF named for the job number and quantity of business cards to be printed.  In the case of these digital cards the quantity is replaced with the word "Digital".  Operators then take those files and crop one card out of the imposed page.

I don't think the process is that onerous, I created an automation sequence with Quite Hot so all they have to do is drop the digital files onto a folder and get cropped copies, but they complain about the extra step anyway. I do appreciate you guys taking the time to entertain their laziness.

[Douglas Cogan]

The only thing I can think of is to run it twice, once with imposer on and once with it off. FP OnRecordStart can detect if the records are imposed or not and can skip the records that are or are not to be imposed (based on the setting). You'd have to run it twice, but just change the imposition setting in between. If that works we can tell you the setting to check for in your OnRecordStart rule.