Enable Dylation dynamic layouts for Adobe InDesign

Disclaimer: The configuration described in this article enables the rendering of dynamic Adobe InDesign layouts in censhare, generated with Dylation as a plug-in for Adobe InDesign. For this purpose, censhare calls the "dynamic layout script" from Dylation to take advantage of that third-party feature. Notwithstanding, censhare does not provide any support for Dylation itself or its scripts and shall therefore not be held responsible for the correct execution of these.

censhare supports dynamic layouts for Adobe InDesign. Dynamic layouts adjust the sizes of page frames and layout boxes according to the rules you define for a page. Besides the native censhare solution, you can use the external Dylation solution for your dynamic layouts. This article explains how to enable this.

Context

Dylation is a third-party dynamic layouts solution for Adobe InDesign. It can be enabled in censhare so that dynamic layouts are rendered and previewed in the Editor for Adobe InDesign documents.

Prerequisites

The Editor for Adobe InDesign documents must be configured in your system. You need access to the censhare server.

Introduction

Dynamic layouts can adjust the size, aspect ratio and margins of page frames and layout boxes for a layout, based on rules. The rules define dependencies on page borders, other frames or content. Content, on the other hand, can also have rules based on its frames. Layout elements are automatically resized when any element with a dependency or rule is changed.

Since censhare 2017.1, a native solution for dynamic layouts is available. As of censhare 2018.2, censhare also supports Dylation dynamic layouts for Adobe InDesign which provides advanced dynamic layout rules. You can use Dylation dynamic layouts instead of the native censhare solution. This has to be enabled in your censhare system. When a user is working with the Editor for Adobe InDesign documents and changes a frame, a page or their contents, the Dylation script is called and the rules are applied. For users, no interaction is required. The script runs in the background and generates the layout.

Note: The configuration described in this article only calls the Dylation script for dynamic layout rendering. It does not provide the script itself. You must upload a valid script to the server in order to use Dylation dynamic layouts.

Enabling the Dylation dynamic layouts

In order to use Dylation dynamic layouts with censhare Web and the censhare Java Client, you have to enable it in censhare Render Client and censhare Java Client separately. The censhare Render Client is used to generate the previews and editor window for censhare Web. In the censhare Java Client, only the previews are generated. Editing is carried out directly in Adobe InDesign on the user's computer.

censhare Render Client

To enable Dylation for the censhare Render Client, you must create a custom version of the following file:

~/censhare-Server/app/modules/client/javarender/javarender-preferences.xml

There are two ways to do this:

(1) Go to the censhare Admin Client, open the entry "Configuration/Modules/Clients/Render Client" and edit the Render Client Preferences. Click "Edit XML file" in the "General setup" section. After saving your changes, do not forget to update the server configuration and - if necessary - synchronize the remote servers.

(2) Copy the file to the custom directory and open it in an external Editor:

~/censhare-Custom/censhare-Server/app/modules/client/javarender/javarender-preferences.xml

Edit the XML file as described below.

censhare Java Client

To configure Dylation for the censhare Java Client, you must create a custom version of the following file:

~/censhare-Server/app/modules/client/javaclient/javaclient-preferences.xml

There are two ways to do this:

(1) Go to the censhare Admin Client, open the entry "Configuration/Modules/Clients/Client" and edit the Render Client Preferences. Click "Edit XML file" in the "General setup" section. After saving your changes, do not forget to update the server configuration and - if necessary - synchronize the remote servers.

(2) Copy the file to the custom directory and open it in an external Editor:

~/censhare-Custom/censhare-Server/app/modules/client/javaclient/javaclient-preferences.xml

Edit the XML file as described below.

Enable Dylation in the XML configuration file

In both files, search the <indesign> node and add the respective attributes and values (see the table below the snippet for details):

<indesign
   mimetype-text=""
   mimetype-text-preview=""
   message-timeout-seconds="600"
   check-picture-file-path="true"
   page-area-frame-color=""
   page-area-frame-shade=""
   page-area-frame-border-color="Cyan"
   page-area-frame-border-width="2"
   new-sub-text-enabled="false"
   new-sub-incopy-text-enabled="true"
   new-sub-incopy-text-top-enabled="true"
   detach-option-enabled="true"
   dissolve-option-enabled="true"
   placeholder-date-format="dd.MM.yyyy"
   placeholder-time-format="HH:mm 'Uhr'"
   create-placeholder-elements="false"
   auto-adjust-pagearea-bounding-box="false"
   include-all-styles-in-icml="true"
   dynamic-layout-solution="dylation"
   dylation-script-file-path="[dylation script file path]"
   dylation-jobworker-folder-path="[dylation jobworker folder path]">
      
   ...
       
    </indesign>

To make the new settings available, save your changes and restart the censhare server.

Result

Whenever a user changes the layout in the Editor for Adobe InDesign documents, the Dylation script is executed and the rules defined for dynamic layouts are applied.