Meeting Summary: InDesign Automation (Scripting, Extensions, XML)

Thu, Nov 18th, 2010 at 5:30 PM

Business Technology Center of Los Angeles County

Event Details

We had two presenters at our November meeting. The lead presenter was Max Dunn of Silicon Publishing who showed examples of InDesign variable data automation using scripting and CS Extensions. He talked about flowing data through InDesign templates and the use of Silicon Designer, an online editing solution for InDesign and InDesign Server created by his company. It was a challenging subject that some understood right off and others not so much. But by the end of his presentation everyone had at least a working knowledge of variable data automation.

Michael Grant demonstrated PDF2ID, a utility by Recosoft that quickly and intelligently converts a PDF document to a fully editable InDesign document. This somewhat more accessible topic produced a lively discussion.

Continuing our policy of holding meetings at diverse locations within the Southland, we held our November meeting in Altadena at the Business Technology Center of Los Angeles County. It was a great space with easy parking. We had a bit of a scare as we had made arrangements with what turned out to be an outgoing administration. But the new leaders -- who were unaware of the arrangements until a few days before the event -- stepped up to the plate and the meeting went off without a hitch.

The turnout was somewhat smaller than usual, but a third of the people were from the area and had never before attended a meeting. We were glad to see the newcomers.

Regrettably, Layers magazine is shutting down in January and so we were unable to give all attenees a copy. The five we did receive were given to Paula Johnson, Peter Palulshyn, Daniel Carmin-Romack, Cathy Romero (as a birthday present) and Judy Walker.

Three of the magazine winners were also winners of the larger prizes. Daniel won a one-year subscription to InDesign magazine, Judy won the Stock Layouts Letterhead Design Cards and Paula won the big prize of the night, Adobe InDesign CS5. Deborah Talley won a copy of PDF2ID Professional, version 3.0.

Thank you

As usual, we'd like to heartily thank the meeting's facilitators: Adobe, Recosoft, StockLayouts, InDesign Magazine, O’Reilly Press, Peachpit Press, official chapter photographer Ron Talley, Michael Grant and especially Max Dunn, who flew down from the Bay Area especially for this presentation.

Job Opportunities

We are looking for people who want to get involved with the administration of the group. Maybe you have web skills, newsletter skills, an eye for photos, want to conduct the raffles. Whatever. Let's talk.

Next Meeting

The topic of the next meeting is "InDesign and Image Masking," wherein you will learn about how to make masked subjects look right in InDesign. As usual, it will take place on the third Thursday, which in January is the 20th. The location will be the Huntington Beach Central Library (to accommodate our South Bay members). Everyone is welcome, of course. If you haven't been to Orange County in a while, attend the meeting and make an evening of it.

Photos from this Meeting

See the photos