PitStop 13 update 1 was developed to provide users in a wide range of markets, including digital and commercial printing and packaging and label with new tools to help them address the challenges of daily production.
New features in PitStop 13 update 1 include improved processing speed, support for adding grommets, preflight restrictions within a shape such as a cutter guide, and a new preflight profile for fixing PDFs created from Microsoft Office documents. Together, these new features support the PitStop position as the leading PDF preflight and auto-correction solution.
Version 13 update 1 of PitStop Server includes new enhancements that improve the speed at which files are processed, giving users a faster way to get jobs through their organisation. Testing has shown that typical speed improvements are between 10-20%, with customers who use physical hard disks experiencing the biggest benefit.
The update includes a greatly enhanced Add Copied Graphic Action. This feature includes expanded functionality that helps users simplify the process of adding graphic objects and page furniture. One of the main uses for this feature is the placement of grommets for large format printing.
This functionality can also be used to distribute a defined number of objects across an area, and enable a step and repeat type of functionality.
When Enfocus released PitStop 13, it included a major change to the Restrictions functionality in the PitStop Preflight engine. Restrictions enable the user to limit the objects or parts of the PDF that are checked, resulting in a preflight check that is more accurate and precise.
The new Select Inside Contour feature of PitStop 13 update 1 builds on that concept, giving users, especially Packaging and Label printers, a way to select objects only within a defined shape, such as a Dieline or a Cutter Guide. The Preflight check will then only check objects that are within or overlapping that shape, ensuring that technical or other non-printing objects such as a legend are ignored. Restriction Actions improve the accuracy and precision of checking what can be very complex PDF files, and reduce the amount of unnecessary warnings or errors generated.
PitStop 13 update 1 also includes customer-requested improvements to the Select Page Action functionality. Customers reported that the Select Pages Action had a limitation regarding the selection of pages from the end of a document. For example, if a printer produces a saddle-stitched job, a typical file would have a page order where the pages are the front cover, inside front cover, inside back cover and back cover.
But the covers of these types of publications often need a different preflight check than the inside covers or the rest of the job. With previous versions of PitStop, it was very difficult to select the last but one page, for example. PitStop 13 update 1 resolves this limitation by giving the user the ability to select pages by counting from the back of the document.
In addition, the Select Pages Action in PitStop 13 update 1 can be used in conjunction with Restrictions to allow the user to select the cover, inside cover and text independently and apply different preflight checks to those pages as applicable.
Printers in all markets receive PDF files from customers that have been created from a variety of applications, such as PDFs from Word or other Microsoft Office applications. Fixing these files often requires a great deal of work for the printer, and sending them back to the customer is time consuming and causes delays.
To make these files work, PitStop13 update 1 includes a special Preflight Profile designed to fix Office based PDF files. The Preflight Profile assumes that the file will be incorrect due to its creating application. Then, with just one click, PitStop supplies the fixes the file needs in order to be printed correctly. Enfocus originally made this preflight profile available to members of the PitStop User Group on LinkedIn. Since then, it has been downloaded and tested by over 500 users.
