Hello,
I'm currently trying to find a solution in the perspective of editing a professional phonebook (+50000 entries in total) wich deals with mixed visual ads and text entries {name addresses and phones}.
My phone book key points are the following :
1) 3 columns layout.
Conditional master selection on a cyclic basis (to cycle trough 4 header and footer advertisement)
2) Text entries are :
Letter categorized (A|B|C|D|...for users pages, and pro categories on pro pages)
Conditionally formatted : 3 styles for handling 3 different type of text entries (normal lines, textad-%26gt;black lines, textad-%26gt;redlines)
plus handling of letter spacing in case the lenght of the entry is too long to fit the column.
3) Graphics entries :
12 differents graphics ads sizes to detect and import, Conditional Positionning/Anchoring of image blocks upon their size. 300dpi CMYK.
4) and for sure phone book style header management (eg. aa-ac)
5) At production time, I project to process data as chunks of 3000 entries at a time, thus representing 30pages or so.
I want minimal hand job once the file automatically processed.
As form what I read so far Indesign and counterperts plugins offer the possibility of automating it.
What I want to know is to wich point ?
Does someone in here did ever worked on something similar, would like to share toughts ?
As I investigate further I'll post my experience in here.
INVESTIGATION AREA WILL COVERS THE FOLLOWING:
DATAMERGE
I forgot about DataMerge wich seems too slow to perform huge amount of data.
EMSOFTAWARE INDATA
CACIDI
My very best regards.
Please also have a look at the electronic version of our phone directory we produced with our team : www.annuaireopt.pf
Phonebook / Phone directory solution...
To begin here are the 50 firts entries of my database
nom prenom adresse phone cat LGN LGR pix pixsize
AA AdÌle PK 6,2 vall{e Piafau Faaa 85.44.95 A
AA Enoc Qt Estall Papeete 42.27.92 A
AA Heimanu Lot Punavai Plaine Punaauia 41.96.57 A
AA Michel Mission Papeete 53.12.07 A
AA Raureva PK 32,8 c/mont Mahaena 52.12.37 A 1
AA Sabrina R{sid Vaitareia Faaa 83.14.08 A
AA Suzanne Puurai Faaa 81.20.07 A
AAA PLOMBERIE Vall{e de Tipaerui Papeete 50.54.10 A
A ANTENNE TOP SARL St Hilaire Faaa 42.55.55 A
ABAD Antoine PK 19,3 c/mont Paea 43.68.42 A 1
ABADI Rose Arue 82.38.08 A
ABADIE Jean-Marc Vall{e Orofero Paea 82.84.03 A
ABAGUY Claude PK 36.5 c/mer Papara 57.22.68 A
ABBES Soraya PK 15 c/mont Papenoo 83.53.63 A
ABC DIFFUSION Rue Cook Papeete 45.29.29 A 1
ABC DIFFUSION A c5_dummy.jpg 56x40
ABC QUINCAILLERIE PK 4,3 c/mont Arue 45.60.95 A
ABC QUINCAILLERIE A l1_dummy.jpg 180x85
ABDEMOUCHE Djalel R{sid Te Ava nui Faaa 53.27.38 A
AB DISTRIBUTION Fataua Papeete 41.24.46 A
AB DISTRIBUTION Fataua Papeete 43.84.11 A
AB DISTRIBUTION Imm Sarateva Papeete 54.87.70 A
AB DISTRIBUTION Ligne informatique Papeete 50.21.85 A
AB DISTRIBUTION A c4_dummy.jpg 56x40
ABE Maire Nui Qtier Atger Papeete 42.25.73 A
ABEROS Norberto Cit? de l'Air Faaa 82.14.18 A
ABIHSSIRA Joseph Taunoa Papeete 42.30.20 A 1
ABILY Olivier Lot Pater Pirae 81.02.54 A
ABLAIN Xavier PK 19,800 c/mont Paea 45.69.42 A
ABOT Guillaume PK 38,900 c/mont Papara 57.04.24 A
ABOULFETH Rahal Resid Cook n[406 Papeete 48.38.46 A
ABOUNAIDANE Adil PK 16,800 c/mont Punaauia 42.55.39 A
ABOUT Serge Imm Laroche Papeete 50.03.70 A
ABOUT Serge Imm Laroche Papeete 85.25.65 A
ABOUT Serge Le Lotus Punaauia 41.28.44 A
ABP CONCEPT Tipaerui Papeete 82.77.66 A
ABRAHAM Christophe PK 39 c/mont Papara 52.11.16 A
ABRAHAM Christophe PK 6,5 c/mont Arue 53.23.27 A
ABRAHAM A c7_dummy.jpg 56x85
ABRAHAM Philippe PK 15 c/mont Punaauia 45.03.31 A
ABS CONSTRUCTIONS Imm Heitiare Pirae 58.27.77 A
ACADEMY OF ENGLISH Taunoa Papeete 53.12.50 A
ACCESSOIRES AND CO Ctre commercial Vaima Papeete 41.09.80 A
ACCONAGE A.TEHIHIRA %26amp; CIE Motu uta Papeete 41.36.43 A
ACCOR PACIFIQUE Punaauia 41.04.04 A
ACCOR PACIFIQUE Punaauia 42.81.21 A
ACCOR PACIFIQUE Punaauia 45.53.32 A
ACCOR PACIFIQUE Punaauia 80.00.95 A
ACCOUSTIC PRODUCTION PK 24 c/mont Paea 43.60.60 A
ACE PACIFIQUE Imm Grand Hotel Papeete 45.56.55 A
Phonebook / Phone directory solution...
********EMSOFTWARE INDATA INVESTIGATION********
I'm using the demo version of Indata 5.1.4.0 along with Indesign CS3 v5.0.4. Indata allows to easily build conditions and process data.
My following prototype does not handle yet : Conditional master, header management, %26amp; letter spacing.
Prototype :
///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
«fields nom, prenom, adresse, phone, cat, lgn, lgr, pix, pixsize
«set pictureposition to framefit»«set picturefolders to .\images\»
«if cat is not prev cat»«cat»«endif»
«--different block style and anchoring applied according to the pics sizes»
«if pixsize = 56x09--C2»«set filename of picture 1 to pix»«endif»
«if pixsize = 56x15--C3»«set filename of picture 2 to pix»«endif»
«if pixsize = 56x23--C4»«set filename of picture 3 to pix»«endif»
«if pixsize = 56x30--C5»«set filename of picture 4 to pix»«endif»
«if pixsize = 56x40--C6»«set filename of picture 5 to pix»«endif»
«if pixsize = 56x85--C7»«set filename of picture 6 to pix»«endif»
«if pixsize = 56x265--C8»«set filename of picture 7 to pix»«endif»
«if pixsize = 180x85--L1»«set filename of picture 8 to pix»«endif»
«if pixsize = 118x265--L2» «set filename of picture 9 to pix»«endif»
«if pixsize = 180x130--L3»«set filename of picture 10 to pix»«endif»
«if pixsize = 180x175--L4»«set filename of picture 11 to pix»«endif»
«if pixsize = 180x265--CL»«set filename of picture 1 to pix»«endif»
«if phone --if the phone exist then its not an image entry»
«if lgn --lgn font style»«nom» «prenom»«if adresse is not empty»«adresse»«endif»......«phone»┐«endif»
«if lgr --lgr font style»«nom» «prenom» «if adresse is not empty»«adresse»«endif»......«phone»┐«endif»
«else --normal font style»«nom» «prenom» «if adresse is not empty»«adresse»«endif»......«phone»┐
«endif»
«else»┐«endif --if phone»
//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
With this little piece of ''code'' I'm already almost to it.
Normal text entries, Texads and GraphicAds are processed nicely into my layout.
The only thing is that I have to manage the biggest GraphicsAds (like full page) by hand because they do not fit when inserted in the middle of a page. And if I anchor the full page Ad to page border, the Ad overlaps all of the text that is before its entry point...This is also true for some of the smaller GraphicsAds but in general all the smaller GraphicsAds (anchored at entry point) wich will represent 75% of the total are quite nicely distributed.
By the way, I found that Indesign itself seems to be quite limited when graphics are anchored inside of text blocks.
It's abylity to flow the text around it seems to me too much limited...
My problem is that sometimes image blocks overlaps either over text either over another image block(s) on the next column.
The real problem is that the image blocks are inserted inside the text block as if it was a text entry, and thus the text entered before the entry point of the image block cannot flow under it...
I guess the problem here is my Indesign layout. Or maybe just a limitation of Indesign...
Either way I guess I'll have to position manually some of the elements once the static file is generated (thing I would like to avoid).
Anybody : Any toughts on the subject ?
My piece of indata code result in the following :
*I have set every image merged to 65% opacity. As you can notice some text lies behind the first 'C7' GraphicAd : that is because in the block style-anchored object-customized- i have selected the option to keep inside column's limit.
Anyway if I do not select that option the block automatically jump on the next column leaving a big undesired white space.
Notice also that second C7 GraphicAd is overlapping L1GraphicAd.
Here the same code with another placement (still automated) of the GraphicAds for you to see how it react :
Tell me i'll not have to manually rearrange 500 pages. ;-)
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