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Issue link: https://digital.macdirectory.com/i/49191
FEA TURE Taking It to the Cloud With one or more articles built, Adobe's cloud services take over via the Folio Builder, launched from a new InDesign panel. Here, you start defining the target device(s) for which you're building the publication. With its initial release, only the iPad is supported, but an Android version is in the works and is scheduled for release later this year. The Folio Producer is the online service that does the work of translating the project you created in the InDesign environment into a real iPad experience. An iPad app version of the Content Viewer gives you the ability to connect to your folio and download a compiled version onto your tablet to get your first real taste of the end-user's experience. The Viewer also makes it possible for members of your team without InDesign to securely view pre-publication versions of your content, enabling anytime/anywhere collaboration and feedback. Placing these components of the Digital Publishing Suite in the cloud has several obvious advantages. First, your entire production team can be given access to the folio to provide input, corrections and manage approval cycles anywhere they are. Secondly, Adobe's engineers are there to make sure that your publication will always work smoothly with supported tablets. The was able to add several designers to its staff rather than bringing on a cadre of software developers. The Folio Producer serves as the final assembly area for the digital publication. It includes tools to add a variety of metadata that help readers navigate the issue and provides data points for Adobe's analytics service, powered by Omniture, how the publication is being viewed. For example, even though they're posted in the same way as articles, ad pages can be flagged for separate tracking. When we spoke with him, Onufer sees the analytics capability as a work in progress and is looking forward to the refinement of its per-issue statistics. However, he has seen a steady improvement and ongoing enhancements to the online segment of the Suite services. Regular, behind-the- scenes upgrades are always a benefit of cloud-based services. Though iOS5's Newsstand will serve as a platform-wide subscription service, the Suite's Viewer Builder Service creates the app package for the subscription, including the required security certificates. Dialog boxes drive the Service, providing publishers with a range of options for not only the look and feel of the app as well as the sales and marketing strategy. The 's free app lets users download a sample issue, buy individual magazines or purchase a subscription. The Viewer Builder Service creates a compiled .ipa file ready for upload to the App Store. The Publishing Suite will push each issue into the app (or Newsstand) as they become available. Onufer believes that Newsstand may increase the popularity of digital magazines in the same way that ePub format has helped book sales. "That will continue drive people who prefer viewing magazines in the digital format to these new devices." There are two versions of the Digital Publishing Suite, Professional and Enterprise. The former has up-front annual fees beginning at $5,500 for up to 25,000 folio downloads and scaling upwards based on the number of downloads. The Enterprise version offers a number of additional, customization, distribution and marketing features was well as the enhanced level of integration support required by large-circulation publications. At the moment, there are over 650 publications using Adobe's DPS, ranging from to . Many, like the , have recognized the power of interactivity and the marketing benefits of the subscription model it provides. Engaging with a well-designed article becomes a remarkably tactile experience for the reader. Electronic publishing with the Suite goes far beyond the original intent of being a convenient and cost-effective way of distributing and viewing content. Onufer summed it up when he spoke of the staff's growing enthusiasm now that several issues have made it onto the iPad, "Everybody who's involved in it understands that this is really the future of publishing." 110 MacDirectory D i S g c e in s e t t ic f i A m e r Ni ac ta on n i R l e G a a e d o e g r r' as p h i c G e o g r a p h i c G e o g r a p h i c