DACS General Meeting By Allan Ostergren Gutenberg’s bible, published in 1455, signaled a revolution that would last for more than half a millennium—the transition of book publishing from a disparate group of monks, artists and essayists, to typesetters and printing houses. Only just recently, in the dawn of the twenty-first century, another information revolution is occurring—returning the power of the press back to the movers and shakers of human knowledge. Information technology has enabled human beings to assemble and distribute ideas at breathtaking speed but there are still bottlenecks. Getting something published in 'trade press' now requires larger 'guaranteed' press runs, so it is harder for someone to publish limited distribution. At our July meeting, Bruce Preston outlined two solutions he has found for his IT clients who are looking to self-publish: e-books and print-on-demand publishing. Desktop publishing has long been dominated by powerful design adversaries like Adobe (Pagemaker, InDesign) and Quark (QuarkXPress). Both platforms are complex, expensive, and tailored to the needs of graphics professionals. Microsoft Publisher, a more light weight option, insists upon the use of templates and comes in a proprietary format not accessible from other Office Products. Bruce turned to PagePlus from Serif, a British independent that has been in the page design business since 1987. Serif has just released version X7 ($99) but version X6 is still available at $60, and a free starter edition is also available. Serif also publishes a variety of independent programs for graphics, Web design, photo editing, and other purposes, although much of this functionality is included in PagePlus. In his presentation, Bruce went through the various tools and 'tabs' in PagePlus, which are similar to those with other mainstream applications. He explained the concept of enclosing text in frames, and showed the difference between regular text and artistic text. He Imported a story from MS Word and demonstrated overflow options, creating a new frame on a new page and storing items on the clipboard to let the user create frames manually. He then demonstrated adding a photo to the article and flowing text around it. PagePlus features line tools such as the "Smart Line", to create Bezier curves for flowing text. Bruce showed how to create a logo by using a line to create a winding path and then having artistic text follow the curve. PagePlus includes Logo Studio for more complex applications. He then showed how a lasso selection tool can be used to tie objects together so they are treated as one. Bruce then demonstrated WritePlus, a full screen text editor, bundled in the program, that lets you edit your copy outside the bounds of the design workspace. A video - one of the approximately 700 tutorials included in the program – was used to show how to remove the background from an image. Advancing to the practical applications of the software, Bruce demonstrated BookPlus – a bundled feature of the program – that lets you create chapter files and arrange them in order, edit and renumber pages, adjust styles, and create a table of contents and index. He showed how he helped a client publish a hard cover book consisting of 32 chapters - each a PagePlus document (.PPP) but tied together with a BookPlus project (.PPB), describing a mechanism for creating a table of contents and an index. In finishing, Bruce showed how to create a business card that displays the front cover of the book on one side and the table of contents on the other. He demonstrated creation of a "Press Ready" PDF file, and discussed the process of getting a book published. Then, on a festive note, he showed a booklet of Christmas carols and jingles – 50 on 28 pages, with appropriate clip-art, all created in PagePlus. Note: If you want to download PagePlus, go to http://www.serif.com/pageplus/. The installation file is 1.6 GB, so you may have to wait several hours, depending on your download speed. When the file has downloaded, it will prompt you to select install. There is a free version of the software, called PagePlus Starter Edition. It is based on a previous version (PPX5). The user must download and install the program, then get an activation code through their email in order to unlock the software. Documents are limited to five pages and there is no output to PDF. The user has access to free designs and templates to download from the site. Caution: when installing the PPSE, do NOT install the ACT.COM toolbar, or let it become browser home page, or allow it to add PagePlus toolbar. If a person tries SE, they get a 40% discount offer towards the purchase of the current full product.
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