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Tips and tricks

Enfocus Pitstop Variable Sets​

Fiery JobFlow supports so-called Enfocus Pitstop Smart Preflight and Smart Action Lists. A couple of things to note about Pitstop Variable Sets:

  1. When you import a Pitstop Variable Set, JobFlow will check the set and make sure that the variables defined in the Variable Set are mapped to Preflight Profiles and Action Lists that use those variables. So if you have a Smart Action Lists that use a variable called "distance", JobFlow will show all Variable Sets that have that variable.
  2. JobFlow will not show Pitstop variables that are only used in Pitstop Variable Set calculations. Example: a user provided value called distance is used to set a variable called "width" by multiplying "distance" by 2. The action list then uses the variable "width", not "distance" to set the width of something. When you use this Variable Set in JobFlow, it will not show the variable "distance". The workaround for this is to add a dummy check, ie. "Document has less than {distance} pages" without logging anything. Now JobFlow will show the variable "distance" in the variable dialog.

In use cases where JobFlow needs to process print streams like PCL or Postscript, often a print-driver based workflow is required. The good news is that with a few simple steps one can add printer ports in Windows 10 that save the output in a JobFlow Smart Folder.

  1. Install Multi File Monitor from Multi File Monitor.
  2. Open printmanagement.msc in Windows 10.
  3. Add new port, select Multi File Port Monitor and name the port. Port name is arbitrary but wise to choose a descriptive name.
  4. Port configuration settings:
    • Output path: c:\SmartFolders\WorkflowName. Needs to be an existing JobFlow workflow.
    • Filename pattern: %t. No other settings need to be configured.
  5. Add printer with this new port.

Check your batch code​

IDE's like Visual Studio Code have excellent support for script languages like Python, NodeJS and Powershell. While working with common windows batch scripts is fine in VSCode it lacks features like syntax checking. Fortunately Rob van der Woude, of the fantastic ss64.com website has created a tool called BatCodeCheck that allows you to check your batch code. More info at: batchcodecheck Run it as BatCodeCheck.exe drive:\path\batchfile.bat /L /W to get a report with suggested improvement or BatCodeCheck.exe drive:\path\batchfile.bat /I to run the tool in interactive mode.

Enfocus PitStop XML reports​

JobFlow will save Enfocus PitStop XML based reports in JobFlow Vault automatically.

Change Enfocus Pitstop report look and feel​

You can change the look and feel of the Enfocus Pitstop reports generated by the JobFlow Preflight and Correct modules by changing the report template at one of the following locations:

  1. If JobFlow is installed on a Fiery: E:\EFI\server\httpd\Neem\Neem\app\plugins\preflight\PitStopLibrarySDK-32bit\Builds\Resources\ReportTemplates\PitStopLibrary\Default.
  2. If JobFlow is installed on a separate Windows environment: C:\Program Files (x86)\Apache Software Foundation\Apache2.2\Neem\Neem\app\plugins\preflight\PitStopLibrarySDK-32bit\Builds\Resources\ReportTemplates\PitStopLibrary\Default.

An extensive guide on how to personalize an Enfocus Pitstop report can be found at Enfocus Support