Layout-8000 15.3.1 (February 2, 2016)

Layout-8000 v15.3.1
2/2/2016

Get Ads

• When "Get Ads" is configured to "Transfer ads to Layout" by SFTP, the "Directory" field is optional.
• The "Interface Tool" menu entry works.
• In XML files, an ad may request up to 75 zones.
• When Layout-8000 checks for new or changed ads, there is a special case that we no longer consider to be a Zone Difference. (1) According to the cardex.txt file, the ad is common. (2) The ad was previously common. (3) Someone zoned the ad in the Design & Dummy area. (4) The ad is alive in every zone. (5) In Global Layout Settings on the "Interface" tab, an administrator checked "Hide differences for common ads that someone zoned."

Design & Dummy area

• When dropping an ad on a page, request conflicts are reported on the Status line.
• Improved automatic placement of ads (auto-dummy). Bob explains:
• The combination of color and left/right page requests is now honored. Previously, if an ad had a color and a left/right page request, its color request was ignored.
• Left/right page requests used to be degradable by default.  Now they are non-degradable by default.  They can be set to degradable in the "More Details" dialog.  That dialog has checkboxes for "left page request" and "right page request".  If one of them is checked, a third box appears;  e.g. of "right page request" is checked the third box says "Allow degrade to a left page".  If that box is checked, auto-dummy tries to put the ad on the requested side page; if it can't, it settles for the other side page.
• Under Global Layout Settings is a new tab labeled Auto-Dummy.  It has one radio button field that allows the site to specify whether non-color ads can go only on non-color pages, only on non-color or spot-color pages, or on any page.  The default is the current behavior; non-color ads can go on any page.
  
  Note that even if a non-color ad is allowed to go on spot-color or full-color pages, the auto-dummy algorithm puts them on such pages only if it can't find a non-color page that satisfies all of the requests for an ad. The algorithm first looks for a non-color page; if there is none where the ad can be placed and spot-color pages are allowed, it looks for a spot-color page; if there is none where the ad can be placed and full-color pages are allowed, it looks for a full-color page.
  
  If the algorithm goes through all of the allowed color categories of pages and the ad can't be placed, it remains unplaced.
  
  Note that if non-color ads are allowed to go on color pages, it is unlikely that placing them there will prevent a color ad from getting a color page. If a color ad has no group request and a non-color ad has a group request, the color ad is placed first if there are fewer color pages than there are pages in the group.  If it turns out that the group has fewer pages than there are color pages in the paper, the non-color might get placed on a color page, but only if there is no available non-color page and placement of non-color ads on color pages is allowed.  If that prevents a color ad from getting on a color page, the color ad will remain unplaced unless color is degradable.  As a result of a change made earlier this year, color is not degradable unless someone purposely makes it degradable.
  
  
• Layout's auto-dummying algorithm does a better job of avoiding a situation where placing a non-double-truck ad with a group request on a double-truck page prevents a double-truck ad with no group request from getting that page.  Previously, a non-double-truck ad with a group request was placed before a double-truck ad with no group request.  Now a double-truck ad is placed  before a non-double-truck ad with a group request.
• Prevented Layout-8000 from hanging when the user deletes all pages in the currently displayed zone.
• Pages can be unzoned from the "Pages" menu.
• Added a user preference that affects the "Unplace inner scope items" toolbar button.
  
  The preference is on the Design & Dummy tab of the user preferences dialog. That's a new tab that replaces the AdBoss tab.  The only thing on that tab was "Enable MABLight", but MetaAdBoss isn't used anymore.
  
  The preference is specified using a radiofield
              When unplacing inner scope items:
                 o Always unplace blocks
                 o Never unplace blocks
                 o Unplace blocks if there are no non-blocks to unplace
  
  The default behavior is the current behavior, Any blocks that are not locked or on a locked page are unplaced.
  
  If the user chooses Never unplace blocks, no block is unplaced; only ads and fillers that are not locked and not on a locked page are unplaced.
  
  With the last choice, the behavior depends on whether there are any ads and fillers to unplace.  If so, pressing the toolbar button unplaces only ads and fillers and not any blocks.  If not, pressing the toolbar button unplace blocks.  To unplace everything with this option, press the button once to unplace ads and fillers, then press it again to unplace blocks.
• When a user presses the "Edit" button next to the "Colors" field on the "Ad" tab, the correct color information is loaded into the dialog.
• Changed the Color Degradation Priority field in the edit colors dialog.
  
  The field is now labeled Color Degradation instead of Color Degradation Priority.  The value is not a priority, but an indicator of how color may or may not degrade for the ad. The info tip shows what the allowed values are and their meanings.
  
  The field is automatically updated when the user enters the dialog or when the color type radiofield changes.
  
  When the user enters the dialog, it checks the color type field.  If it indicates No Color, the field is changed to empty.  If it indicates Full Color or Selected Colors, the value is left alone if it is a valid value of 1, 2, or 3. If it is anything else, it is set to 1, meaning don't degrade.  The same rule is applied when the user changes the color type radiofield.
  
  When the user changes the Color Degradation field, the validation procedure checks the value.  If it is empty, the validation reports an error unless the color type indicates No Color.  If not empty, the value must be 1, 2, 3; if not, the validation reports an error.
  
  When writing the value back to the insertions record, if the color type indicates No Color, the value written is 0.  Otherwise, if the value of the dialog field is written to the insertion unless the value is anything other than 1, 2, 3; in that case, the value written is 1.
• Improved validation of the Ad Vendor ID field on three forms. Layout-8000 will automatically remove spaces from an Ad Vendor ID. Letters are forced to uppercase. That is consistent with how ad IDs are handled.
• Fixed a test that is used to determine whether to warn the user that there are no double-truck pages available for the double-truck ads in the product.

Reports

• When emailing a report, a numeric keypad may be used to type numbers in the message body.
• Because Classic PGL is obsolete, its menu item will be removed from the Reports menu.

Send to Pagination

• CCI XML files once again have AdExtensionFields named AccountNo, Earlug and Island.

Maintenance

• Corrected hot keys for a pop-up choice during the "Purge Products" process.
• Database Ranges may be exported to a spreadsheet or CSV file. Previously, only the currently active list (e.g. groups) could be exported. It is now possible to export all Database Ranges. CSV file names are based upon the range that was exported.

High Availability (HA)

• When a system administrator runs "/etc/mirror/mkprime", that triggers a series of tests on both servers. We have improved how each server shares its test results with the other server, thus avoiding a "unary operator" error.