Tag: Document Publisher

A user wants to output bottom level items in Document Publisher. As bottom level items do not have anything linked below them, this can be set in a hierarchy table.

How this works for Bottom Level Items

All it takes is 3 rows in a hierarchy. The first row works as any item above the bottom level items. The second row will actually be for items on the bottom level. The third level is used as a check that the items are bottom level. It makes sure that no items are linked in a Downward direction using that Link Type for the 2nd row to be output.

If there are items linked below the item, using the Link Type set, then it is not a bottom level item and will not be output. Although this can be used with many different hierarchy levels, as long as the last row is always set as below.

Creating the hierarchy Table

So open the Hierarchy Details dialog and set the top item type to the type you require (here we are using Requirements). Leave level this as it is already set. Click the Add Row button and set the Follow Links to Downwards. The arrow next to the second level item show point towards it. Set the Link Type for this level, in this case it is RELATED TO. Next is the Publish Subject Items option which sets what will be published based on your links. Set Publish Subject Items to Only if link exists.

Select the second level item type and click the Copy Row button.

Select the last row and click the Indent button. The Publish Subject Items now needs to be set to Only if link does not exist.

The nodes without any options set should be grey, click OK and repeat for each Field required. All item attribute nodes in the Tags sidebar now show as on (Row 2).

Generating the template

When the template is generated, only the second row item will be output containing the bottom level items. For a short example to be output, the Key is set to 1.1*.

Company Templates

Does your company use different types of Microsoft® Word template for different types of document? Did you know that you can use those company templates inside Document Publisher?

Document Publisher has different locations you can save the files to but it can also open files from outside these locations as well. These files will then be shown as ‘local’ and can then be edited in Document Publisher. Once you are happy with the company template it can be saved to any one of the locations the user has access to within Cradle.

Loading an External Template

Select the File menu and then New, then From Existing Template and select the template type the user wishes to open. Once the Template dialog opens, click the Local... button.

This will then open explorer in which the user can then locate and open the file they require.

This will then open the file named as NewTemplate and not as the name of the file you have opened from. Once you have added at least one tag, Document Publisher will allow you to save the template.

Saving a File

The first is to select the File menu and Save, then the Template dialog opens, the user can either save it to one of the locations they can access or as below, select the Local… button and rename and save it through Explorer.

This will then save the file to that location and show in Document Publisher as (Local).

This file when finished can then be saved into a Cradle location e.g. Project so it can then be published through WorkBench. To do this the user will click the File menu and then Save and when the Template dialog opens, select the Location the user requires and change the name they want the file to have.

This will now show it is saved in the project location. This can be done to any location the user has access to.

To see how to Publish through WorkBench, click here

For Publishing a draft template, click here

For free Microsoft® Office templates and themes, click here

There are two ways to generate a Document Publisher table. The first table generation method is the Default, this outputs each item row by row. This generation is slower but allows for different styles and formatting in a cell.

The second table generation method is XML which is faster but does not allow for different styles and formatting within a cell. If the user is outputting a simple table then XML is the way to go, especially if it is a large table.

This article highlights some of the limitations and pitfalls with XML output.

A Simple Table Generation

Outputting a simple but large table is quicker by setting the Generation Method to XML.

Outputting the above table using a hierarchy as above is much faster using the XML method rather than the Default method.

Differences in Styling Text in a Cell When Using the XML Generation Method

Taking the table above and formatting all the tags in different ways to make them stand out can cause some problems in the XML.  For instance the user may wish the Verification Method to be output in a different colour to the rest of the Verification information at present this would cause issues with an XML Table Generation Method.

In the above screen-shot, I have made the Identity and Name of the Verification blue and the Method green. This currently limitation means when generated using the XML Generation method, none of the text is seen under the Verification column.

Setting the Verification Method to the Automatic Font colour, the text is output but the Identity and Name will still not show.

The only way to have the output show correctly is to put the Font Colour on the whole cell:

The user can even have all the different columns in different colours and this will output each item and column correctly.

The same goes for making text bold, italic or underlined; unless it is on the whole cell it will cause issues with the output.

Differences in using Formatting Marks in a Cell

Placing formatting marks like between tags in the same cell is also subject to limitations. Placing a single carriage return (new line) between 2 tags can cause the second tag to not be output if placed incorrectly:

When done correctly can still output as the user requires, make sure the cursor is before the bookmark and press Shift+Enter:

Or just putting a full carriage return (paragraph end)  between the tags, making sure the cursor is between the 2 bookmarks and not inside one of them:

The alignment of text within a cell must also be the same, the user cannot have one tag as left aligned and another right or center aligned unless there is a full carriage return between them.

You also cannot use Ctrl+Tab for a single tag in the cell as the data will not show in the output.

For more information on Tables in Document Publisher click here

Running Document Publisher in the Background

Publishing a Draft or Formal Document can take time. If you need to use Microsoft® Word for other work, is a nuisance when having to wait.

Users can run a batch file to create the documents either as a Draft and/or as a Formal document. The batch file can be used in a task while the user is not using their computer; for example at night or a weekend if many documents are being generated.

The command line needs to have all the options set the same as they would  be through the UI (User Interface):

Formal Document Command line Options

The normal batch file command line options for just a draft document are:

Each of the following shows what the command line options for each Formal option in the User Interface:

All the above -fdoc options are requirements within the command line except -newversion. Only use the -newversion option, if a new version of the document is required.

The final command line to generate the DEMO Template will look like this: (NOTE: Options with more than a single word are required to be in quotes e.g. -fdoccomment “Published DEMO Template Using Batch File”)

"%CRADLEHOME%\bin\exe\windows\DocPub.exe" -login MANAGER,MANAGER,demo -file "DEMO Template" -location PROJECT -type DOCX -output "C:\Temp\DEMO Template.doc" -formal -fdocname "DEMO Template" -fdoctype REQUIREMENTS -fdoctitle "DEMO Template" -fdocissue 1 -fdocdate Jun -fdocref DEMO1 -fdocclass UNCLASSIFIED -fdoccomment "Published DEMO Template Using Batch File" –log

Any template that generates through Document Publisher can generate through a batch file.

As you can see in the command window below, 3 templates are being generated, a doc, a docx and a docm.

Once the documents are generated, they can be seen in WorkBench in the Project sidebar under the Formal Document sections:

Using parameters within a batch file

The great thing about using a command line batch file is that parameters can be set, as long as the template has parameters setup. This means you can run the same document many times but use different parameters for each run with a different document output name. For example if you used ?reqID within the Key or Identity you could output different Requirement Documents.