Xerox FreeFlow Process Manager 8.0 Manifest Automation

Software Version 9.0 October 2010

701P50851

FreeFlow® Process Manager

Manifest Automation from Xerox

Changes are periodically made to this document. Changes, technical inaccuracies, and typographic errors will be corrected in subsequent editions.

Document Version: 2.0 (October 2010).

FreeFlow Process Manager Manifest Content

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1 Table of Contents

1! Table of Contents...................................................................................... 3!

2! Introduction................................................................................................. 4!

Summary of Chapter........................................................................................................................ 4!

Intent.................................................................................................................................................. 4!

Audience and Skill set.................................................................................................................. 4!

Terminology..................................................................................................................................... 4!

3! MAX Overview............................................................................................. 6!

Summary of Chapter........................................................................................................................ 6!

What is FreeFlow Process Manager MAX ........................................................................... 6!

Applications Supported .............................................................................................................. 6!

High Level view of MAX .............................................................................................................. 7!

4! Manifest Processing.................................................................................. 9!

Summary of Chapter........................................................................................................................ 9!

Manifest Files.................................................................................................................................. 9!

Parsing Manifest Files.................................................................................................................. 10!

Mapping Manifest Data To Manifest Fields ..................................................................... 13!

Bill of Materials Configuration ................................................................................................ 20!

Manifest Submission Status File............................................................................................. 21!

Using MAX variables in Process Manager workflows .................................................... 23!

Print Ticket Processing................................................................................................................. 25!

Best practices.................................................................................................................................. 27!

5! Walk Through example........................................................................... 29!

Summary of Chapter........................................................................................................................ 29!

Explore the ESv9 - Personalized Cards example .............................................................. 29!

Demonstration of the Example............................................................................................... 32!

Example discussion....................................................................................................................... 35!

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2 Introduction

Welcome to FreeFlow Process Manager Manifest Automation from Xerox (MAX).

Summary of Chapter

The purpose of this chapter is to provide you a high level overview of:

• Intent

• Audience and Skill set

• Terminology

Intent

This document was designed to explain how to submit documents to FreeFlow Process Manager through an interface known as Manifest Automation from Xerox. This document is intended for integration professional s who wis h to understand the MAX interface included with FreeFlow Process Manager.

Audience and Skill set

This guide has been created for Xerox Analysts, software developers, technical developers, and integration professionals .

Terminology

The major elements of FreeFlow Process Manager MAX are:

• Manifest Automation from Xerox (MAX) The process of enabling automated job submission by processing manifest

files.

• Manifest file The manifest file is a delimited file that contains informational and control

data required to submit jobs to Process Manager.

• Manifest record A single row in a manifest file.

• Manifest column The values in the same position across all manifest records in the manifest

file.

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• Manifest field A data field that is used by Manifest processing to pass job information to

FreeFlow Process Manager. Manifest columns are mapped into manifest fields based on the MAX configuration.

• FreeFlow variable A FreeFlow variable is a representation of job metadata within a process

node setting. FreeFlow variables can come from both MAX variables as well as JDF variables.

• Status file A manifest file with two additional columns used to provide manifest

submission status.

• Bill of Materials The Bill of Materials, or BOM for short, is a summary of the jobs submitted

as part of a single order in a manifest. The summary is based on the manifest file data and configured workflow parameters.

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3 MAX Overview

Summary of Chapter

The purpose of this chapter is to provide you with an overview of:

• What is FreeFlow Process Manager MAX

• Applications Supported

• High Level view of MAX

What is FreeFlow Process Manager MAX

FreeFlow Process Manager automates prepress activities and increases the operation’s overall efficiency. MAX (Manifest Automation from Xerox ) builds on Process Manager’s capabilities, streamlining the order-fulfillment process by connecting order-management systems to automated print production.

The result is a smooth, automated process from work-order submission through print submission. MAX reduces and in many cases eliminates “touch points” between the order-entry process and production, and helps maximize productivity and profit.

Applications Supported

Process Manager Automation Software, in general, supports all the major Monochrome and Color publishing applications. The supported applications include manuals, directories and technical documentation, flyers, brochures, business cards, books and course materials, proposals and reports, books, news letters, photo, and postcards, etc.

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High Level view of MAX

Process Manager MAX connects the print provider's order-management system, print MIS, FreeFlow Web Services, or other Web to Print systems with automated print production. It enables a print provider to process orders automatically by submitting a manifest file containing order records to Process Manager.

Each record in the manifest file corresponds to a job or part of a job from the order-management system. Each record might include information such as the order number, copy count, media, filename, barcode information, and production method (an identifier mapped to a Process Manager automated workflow). Records may also contain information for job personalization or for the Bill of Materials.

MAX is capable of accepting input from multiple sources at one time. Manifest files from each source can be processed using a different hot folders and MAX configurations. MAX also supports automated pre-scripting. This enables automatic conversion of input files into compliant manifest fil es in order to enable integration with systems that may not be able to produce a compliant manifest file.

MAX Configuration Overview

• Define workflows in Workflow Builder

• Set-up Hot Folder for Manifest processing in Workflow Builder

- Create a Hot Folder and select the “Enable this folder for use with

manifest automation” option.

• Use Manifest Automation from Xerox configuration tool to:

- Define Hot Folder manifest processing options

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! Specify the manifest column that contains the Production Method

- Map Production Method values to a desired workflow and to a MAX

configuration

- Define a MAX configuration to map the manifest columns to Manifest

fields.

• Optionally, add mapped manifest fields to process node settings in workflow.

MAX Processing Overview

• Manifest file gets dropped into the designated Hot Folder. For each record in the manifest the following happens:

- The value found in the Production Method is used to select a MAX

configuration

- The MAX configuration is used to map the manifest columns to the

Manifest Fields

- The value found in the Production Method field is used to select a

FreeFlow Process Manager workflow

- The values in the Manifest fields are applied to the workflow process

node settings that use MAX variables

- The job file(s) are retrieved

- The job files are submitted to the workflow

• A manifest status file is generated

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4 Manifest

Processing

Summary of Chapter

This chapter provides an overview of the following:

• Manifest Files

• Parsing Manifest Files

• Mapping Manifest Data To Manifest Fields

• Bill of Materials Configuration

• Manifest Submission Status File

• Using MAX variables in Process Manager workflows

• Print Ticket Processing

• Best practices

Manifest Files

A manifest file is a text file where record fields are separated by a configurable delimiter. Each record may represent a s ingle job or be part of a multi-part job.

A sample manifest file with five columns of data and a comma [,] delimiter is organized as follows:

Rec1Col1,Rec1Col2,Rec1Col3,Rec1Col4,Rec1Col5

Rec2Col1,Rec2Col2,Rec2Col3,Rec2Col4,Rec2Col5

Rec3Col1,Rec3Col2,Rec3Col3,Rec3Col4,Rec3Col5

Rec4Col1,Rec4Col2,Rec4Col3,Rec4Col4,Rec4Col5

In this example, RecNo. specifies the record number and ColNo. specifies the field number.

A manifest file with actual data could look like this (space added for legibility):

Convert-print, C:\\cust1001\covers.doc, 1001, MAKE, 500

Watermark-print, C:\\cust1001\intro.pdf, 1001, MAKE, 500

Review-print, C:\\cust1001\chap1-5.pdf, 1001, MAKE, 500

Review-Save, C:\\cust1001\memo.pdf, 1001, PICK, 1

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Parsing Manifest Files

Manifest files are submitted to and parsed by FreeFlow Process Manager Manifest hot folders.

Adding a Manifest hot folder

Use Workflow Builder to create a hot folder. Then check the Enable this folder for use with manifest automation checkbox to associate the hot folder with

the Submitted with Documents target workflow.

By default, a Manifest hot folder will parse manifests that:

• have the Production Method in column 1

Note: The Production Method is the value that’s used to automatically select a process manager workflow for a job.

• are comma separated

• use no text qualifier

Header records

When the # symbol is the first character in a record, it indicates to FreeFlow Process Manager that the record is a header record. These records are ignored when parsing manifest files.

Configuring a Manifest hot folder

Manifest hot folders can be configured to support delimited files other than the default CSVs. This allows manifest file parsing to accommodate constraints from upstream systems.

To change the default manifest hot folder options, select Hot Folders Options from the Manifest Automation from Xerox configuration tool.

Job Submission

The options in the Job Submission tab control how jobs in the manifest are submitted to Process Manager:

The value in the Production Method is used to identify the job type that’s represented in each manifest record. Different job types are usually submitted to different workflows. The Production Method value is built from up to five columns in the manifest.

The Production Method is also used to select a Manifest configuration that will be used to map the parsed manifest columns to manifest fields.

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Note: Manifests will not process if the manifest configuration for a given Production Method specifies a column that’s not in the manifest.

The Submission Options are used to specify whether to create a composite job from contiguous manifest records with the same order ID, Group key, and Production Method values. This hot folder configuration parameter can be set to either Always submit groups of files as a single job or Submit groups of files

as a single job only if the workflow has a join process node.

Processing Options

The options in the Processing Options control how manifest records are processed.

Two parameters define how values are found in each manifest record:

The Column delimiter at order jacket file defines the delimiter that separates the values in the manifest file.

The Text Qualifier is used to surround the values in the manifest file. It may be set as none, single or double quotes. If a text qualifier is used, it must be used to enclose all values in the manifest records. Use of a text qualifier allows the values in the manifest record to contain the specified delimiter.

For example if the delimiter is a comma and one of the fields in a record contains the text Xerox, Process Manager, Xerox and Process Manager will be separated into two field values, thus causing an error during parsing. If you use " as the tex t qualifier, then “Xerox, Process Manager” wil l be processed as a single field whose value is Xerox, Process Manager.

Note: Leading and trailing spaces in the manifest values are ignored by default. However, if a text qualifier is used then leading and trailing spaces are included in the manifest values.

The Process header row of the order jacket file option determines whether the first row should be processed. This can be used to ignore a header row that does not start with the # symbol.

Note: Any row, including the first row, that begins with a # symbol is ignored when processing the manifest.

Two parameters define error-handling policies:

The When an error occurs while processing an order jacket file specifies whether to stop processing a manifest if errors occur.

The When an error occurs while processing an order specifies whether to stop processing an order within a manifest if errors occur.

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After a manifest is processed, the manifest is saved with two additional status columns appended to each manifest record. This manifest status file can be saved to either a subfolder of the manifest hot folder or to a specified location. For more information see the Manifest Submission Status File section.

Conversion Script

You can have a script run on any file that is received by the hot folder and use output of the script for MAX processing. The purpose of the script is to transform, normalize, or convert submissions into a manifest that can be processed by MAX. You can define the following manifest attributes:

Script full path - This is the script to run. It must include the full path. You can use the File Browser to find the script.

Parameters - Specifies the format of the parameters passed to the script. By default the script parameter list must include the following:

– $in$ - input file location (the file received by the hot folder) – $out$ - output file location (the full path of the output file to be processed by MAX) – $error$ - error file location

You can specify additional switches needed by the script and re-order the switch and parameters. For example, if your script takes four parameters in the following order:

-v -f input_file error_location –o output_file Then the parameter field should be: -v -f $in$ $error$ -o $out$

Error file directory - This directory is passed to the script as the $error$ parameter. This directory is not monitored by MAX and is provided as a convenience.

Timeout - The timeout period specifies how long MAX should wait for the script output prior to timeout.

When a file is dropped in the hot folder, MAX will make a CLI call using a string that concatenates the script full path and the parameters. If the CLI call requires quotes around the path or around specific parameters, they should be added in the conversion script configuration.

The manifest hot folder accepts any file type when the conversion script is enabled. The result of running the script must be saving a manifest to the location specified in the $out$ variable.

Manifest Data

The manifest hot folder configuration defines how manifests should be parsed in order to extract values from the delimited file. The output of the manifest hot folder parsing is normalized manifest data. This internal data is then mapped to manifest fields using the selected manifest configuration.

The mapping between the manifest hot folder and the manifest configurations can be a combination of any of the following:

• A single hot folder processes manifests that use a single manifest configuration

• A single hot folder processes manifests that use multiple manifest configurations

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