PTC ALD only Features in Arbortext Styler
Arbortext Styler provides a number of PTC ALD only features. These are areas where the PTC ALD engine provides capabilities which are either difficult or impossible to achieve using the FOSI engine.
Settings for these features are only applicable in output published from Arbortext Styler with the PTC ALD engine.
• Hanging punctuation
Chinese and Japanese language formatting often requires hanging punctuation. The feature can also be used by Western formatting of text.
The default hanging punctuation provided with Arbortext Styler allows western and ideographic full stops and commas to hang outside the text measure. The non-punctuation text on the right of the column lines up, which is more visually appealing.
The Hanging punctuation field is located in the Indent property category.
A more extensive set of hanging punctuation can be accessed through a small source edit. Change this entry:
style.kerningTable = '_app:HangingPunctuationSimple';
to this entry:
style.kerningTable = '_app:HangingPunctuation';
• Layout direction
Layout direction in Arbortext Styler provides support for right-to-left writing languages, such as Arabic and Hebrew. A right-to-left layout direction differs from left-to-right in these areas:
◦ the text flow direction in a column
◦ the order in which columns are filled
◦ the edges to which left and right margins and indents are applied
◦ the direction of headers and footers (if the right-to-left layout direction is applied to the whole document)
Layout direction does not change the order in which pages are output to files.
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In right-to-left writing languages, odd page numbers are left pages and even page numbers are right pages.
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The Layout direction (print/PDF only) field is located in the Indent property category.
• Side by side formatting
Although not strictly an PTC ALD only feature, PTC ALD was the focus for developing this output for print. PTC ALD functionality was modeled closely on that provided by CSS floats.
Arbortext Styler provides a Side by side property category.
• PDF tagging
PDF tagging support provides part of PTC’s accessibility compliance for Section 508 and W3C WCAG.
The tagging applied to a particular output chunk is based on the style applied to the element in Arbortext Styler. You can select the PDF tag you want to output and set attributes on that tag using XPath expressions.
The stylesheet’s Print /PDF property Generate tagged PDF must be set to include PDF tags in output.
Arbortext Styler provides a PDF tags property category.
• onExit code in property sets
As a default, PTC Arbortext Layout Developer works with explicit instructions to deactivate properties, rather than allowing them to stop at the end of an XML structure. As an exception it will reset properties when it encounters a hard return or when a block ends.
If properties have been changed in property sets, it is natural to reset them. Arbortext Styler now provides onEnter and onExit events for property sets. Property sets and contexts create PTC Arbortext Layout Developer tags, and one each is created for the onEnter and the onExit code.
• Alternative blank pages
A document can include different right and left blank pages.
Select the required page types for blank pages in the Page types property category of the Page Sets interface
• Column gutter rules
PTC Arbortext Layout Developer applies columns using blocks. The column gutter rule, a rule in the space between columns, is a block region rule.
Configure column gutter rules in the Columns property category of the Page Sets interface.
• Unequal column and column gutter widths
PTC Arbortext Layout Developer allows widths of columns, and the gutters between them, to be any size.
The subcategories of the Columns property category of the Page Sets interface provide the means to specify column and column gutter widths.
• XPath location for page region background graphic
The location of a page region background graphic can be specified as an external file location. If working with the PTC ALD engine, an XPath expression can evaluate the location path of the graphic from somewhere in the content.
The Graphic property category of the Page Regions interface provides a tool to specify a background graphic.
• Page region border rules
PTC Arbortext Layout Developer allows up to 20 region border rules to be applied to a frame. A single rule can be applied with the Arbortext Styler user interface.
The Borders property category of the Page Regions interface provides options to configure border rules for a region.
Use PTC ALD source edits to extend this feature and apply up to 20 different rules.
• Page region page clipping
In Arbortext Styler page regions are allowed to bleed off the edge of page as a default. Page clipping stops the output file containing the information (content, borders, background colors, and so on) that bleeds. The information is lost, but it is not output into the PDF outside the page area.
The Clip region at page edge option is provided in the Other property category of the Page Regions interface.
• Page region avoidance
When page regions are stacked on top of each other so they overlap, content will overset other content as a default. The Avoid option forces content to wrap around the regions which appear above them in the stacking order. To provide a runaround (margin) around the frame, use the margin settings in Arbortext Styler.
The Avoid option is provided in the Other property category of the Page Regions interface.
