Understanding Customizations in ePublisher Projects
With the release of ePublisher 2018.1, many customers are eager to upgrade and take advantage of new features. However, upgrading to a new format in ePublisher starts with your existing ePublisher Designer project. Before making any changes to your project, it's crucial to understand where customizations are located, as they play a significant role in your project's functionality.
Customizations in ePublisher projects can be found in three different areas:
The Style Designer Tab
The Style Designer is where you define how your content will appear in the Content Display area. It imports style names and information from your source documents. In the Style Designer, you can customize information such as fonts, sizes, positions, backgrounds, and behaviors like page breaks and search relevance. To access the Style Designer, navigate to the View tab and select Style Designer.
Customizations within the Style Designer are organized into four tabs: Properties, Options, Target Properties, and Target Options. Any areas with customizations will appear in bold, and selecting them will display the corresponding customizations in the Style Designer Window.
Customizations in the Properties or Options tab will automatically carry over to Reverb 2.0, while customizations in the Target Properties or Target Options tab apply only to the selected target and must be manually transferred to new targets.
Target Settings Window
Target settings customizations differ from those in the Style Designer and Advanced tab. These customizations are located in the Target Settings window, distinct from the ePublisher Working Area. You can customize items such as company name, logo, Google ID, reports, and content activation/deactivation in the table of contents, index, and footers.
To access the Target Settings window, click on the Target tab in the menu bar and select Target Settings.
It's essential to manually transfer these customizations to Reverb 2.0. Keep in mind that some categories in Target Settings may differ based on the selected format for your target, but the differences are logical and easily identifiable.
Advanced Tab
The Advanced tab contains customizations within default program files of ePublisher. These files include HTML templates, CSS, JavaScript, XSL, and other coding languages. As editing these files requires basic coding knowledge, they are categorized under the Advanced tab.
The Advanced tab is located on the menu bar next to the View tab and contains two sections: Manage Format Customizations and Manage Target Customizations. Format customizations apply to any target with that format, while target customizations apply exclusively to the selected target.
Understanding these three areas of customizations in your Designer Project is essential for effectively using ePublisher to deliver your message to your audience. Whether customizations carry over automatically, require manual inclusion, or are unnecessary, identifying and comprehending these areas will help meet the evolving needs of your audience.