Release: Xtags 6/7/8.3.4 for QuarkXPress 6/7/8

January 3, 2011 by car

This release of Xtags for QuarkXPress adds tags for hyperlinks, a speed-up for anchored boxes and, in the server XTension, support for multiple imports into named boxes.

Changes

• Added native support for hyperlinks and text anchors. The new tags are:
  • &Ys marks the start of a text hyperlink
  • &Ye(hyperlink name, page number, style name) ends a text hyperlink and creates a page reference
  • &Ye(hyperlink name, URL, style name) ends a text link and creates a URL reference
  • &Ye(hyperlink name, #anchor name, style name) ends a text link and creates an anchor reference
  • &Yb(relative box ref, ...same as any of &Ye parameters)
  • &Ya"anchor name" drops a named text anchor

  To put these into use, we would recommend creating some hyperlinks in a scratch document, generating their tags via Edit > Copy with Xtags and then modifying those tags to meet your needs.

  The <&Ya"foo">quick brown fox jumps <&Ys>over<&Ye("foo hyperlink", "#foo")> the lazy dog. will generate a text anchor named “foo”, then create a hyperlink named “foo hyperlink” to that anchor on the text “over”. (Note that text anchor references must be prefaced with a #.)

  The quick brown fox jumps <&Ys>over<&Ye(, "http://emsoftware.com")> the lazy dog. will create an anonymous URL hyperlink on the text “over” to our website.

• Added support for multiple imports into named boxes via a new "@xtagsimport" parameter modifier. (Server only)

  Our import parameter mimics the QuarkXPress Server Modifier XT’s "@dataimport" format as

  <box-name> "&xtagsimport=" (<text> | "file:" <path>)

  where <box-name> is an extant text box <text> is literal tagged text and <path> is either a platform-style absolute path (like "file:c:\foo\bar.txt" or "file:Macintosh HD:foo:bar.txt") or a doc pool-relative partial path using either platform or URL/Unix separators (like "file:xtags:bar.txt" and "file:xtags/bar.txt").

  This format allows for multiple imports, like

  http://localhost:8080/jpeg/testdoc.qxp?tb1@xtagsimport=SomeText&tb2@xtagsimport=file:foo.xtg&reporterrors=1

  Note that hard errors (like <box-name> not found, <box-name> not a text box, <path> not found or import failure) are ignored. (Which also mimics the Modifier XT, and allows all imports to complete as best they can.)

• Addressed a performance issue in Q7/8 so that text containing anchored boxes now imports just about as quickly as it does in Q4/6.
• Made Pro features (table generation, namely) available in Demo mode.