XML in Quark or Illustrator

[HiTech_Monkeyboy]

Does anyone out there deal with using XML files for placing as text in Quark or Indesign? We have a customer that is going to supply XML. Heard a lot of good things but don't have any real experience with it. Is there a good tutorial out there on the web somewhere or an app/script/applet that can help with the formatting process? If anyone can give me a push in the right direction, I'd appreciate it.

Thanks,
Monkey

 

[michaelejahn]

Re: XML in Quark or Illustrator

Hi Mr. Monkey,

I think what you might be looking for is a way for some database to create a file that can then be imported by a design application (normally Quark XPress or InDesign) - where the application (or via a Plug-in) paces and converts the text and auto populates either text boxes, imports images, makes version (regional, personalized, etc..) and - perhaps - even takes this text file (it could be a text file (.txt), a comma delimited file (.csv), an Excel file - or (of course) and xml file (which follows some schema and DTD).

a good place to start (of course) is Adobe;

http://www.adobe.com/products/indesign/scripting/

or Quark

http://www.quark.com/service/desktop/support/techinfo/view.jsp?faq_id=409

(i simply typed "XML Import InDesign" and "XML import Quark" into Google - you should try that sometime. ;-)

I would start with any vendor who markets database publishing tools.

one popular one is Meadows.

http://www.meadowsps.com/site/main/odbc.htm

my old freind Chris Ryland makes a powerful solution - http://www.emsoftware.com/products/xdata/

back in 1994, we used X-Data to take data dumps from an IBM AS400 via a coax cable into a Mac - plug-in would build an entire set of quark documents from SCATCH - that is, all we needed to have Quark running and the X-Data plug-in took the text and built hundreds of QUark Document from Scratch.

Another very powerful solution is RoboCatalog - http://www.robocatalog.com/

Hope this helps !

Michael Jahn
Jahn & Associates

 

[chasd]

Re: XML in Quark or Illustrator

My Google search produced an XRay article that was a simple tutorial, but I assumed the OP had already done some searching, My impression was he was looking for some hands-on advice rather than synthetic samples as found on the web. I have only done some simple XML tests, so I am also interested in any real-world examples posted to this thread.


Chasd.

 

[michaelejahn]

Re: XML in Quark or Illustrator

@ Charles Dostale

you wrote;

"...interested in any real-world examples posted to this thread."

This is a pretty tall order - how would I post a Quark Document, liked to a database which pours data into specific fields and generates a result !?

I think the best way to accomplish what you need is to contact a vendor and download a trial - or hire a consultant - this is not something simple like a find / change sequence.

Perhaps if you explained an example clearly, someone might pop up with a 'we do that this way' - otherwise, i think I could not come up with a better example than what I found using Google search;

http://www.quark.com/service/desktop/support/techinfo/view.jsp?faq_id=409

hope this helps !

 

[HiTech_Monkeyboy]

Re: XML in Quark or Illustrator

Sorry it's taken me so long to actually respond to the answers here, it's been a rough fortnight.

OK, so I had hung my yahoo out and googled it but wasn't getting anything that would give me a background to start from, most of the articles I saw seemed to assume that if you knew what XML was then you apparently knew the secret handshake and nothing more needed to be said. In the meantime, I have found out that I am not getting "Well Formed" XML from the customer in question. Therefore, all the tutorials in the world aren't going to help either of us this year. I'm very interested in the XData xtension or InData as well. Both look promising. I'll need to take an 099 course on scripting but it shouldn't be that difficult to pick it up again well enough to format a directory. I would like to know how anyone else is handling formatting like this, it's for a directory as such, "Last name, First Name, Address, Phone and Email". Sounds simple but there are several THOUSAND names.

Is that clearer? How do you guys handle this, Is there a script I can pick up somewhere and tweak, Is anyone out there using XData? Looking forward to these answers.

Thanks for trying to help me,

Monkey