The Cole Digest, April 17, 1996

With an all-digital display ad makeup department (using Harris systems and Multi-Ad Creator on the Macintosh), Alameda Newspapers faced a dilemma:

How long do you keep an ad available on disk?

The Associated Press started talking about using Adobe Acrobat technology in its AdSEND system and Director of Systems Management Grady Cooper had found his solution -- except there were a number of problems with Version 1 of Acrobat. It didn't handle font embedding well and the search capabilities were tied to Version 2, which wasn't scheduled for release until fall 1994.

But Cooper was persistent with Adobe and his local computer supplier, and got an early release of Version 2. "We got 2.0 two months before the AP got it," he said.

"We installed it and we immediately realized it not only met our expectations, but exceeded them," said Cooper.

The next step was to integrate Acrobat into the pagination operation. Alameda Newspapers uses the Harris XP-21 pagination server that's based on a Sun SPARCstation to handle page elements and output PostScript code to four Harlequin RIPs through Output Manager, a routing and tracking application from Information International Inc. of Los Angeles.

Cooper elected to have the XP-21 create a second PostScript file, which was shunted off to another directory in the Sun.

The Acrobat Distiller program runs on a Pentium 90 MHz PC ("We determined a '486 wouldn't do it") with 32 megabytes of RAM. The Pentium sits on the same network as the Sun; using a program called PC/TCP from FTP Software of North Andover, Mass., the files are sent to the Pentium's directory using File Transfer Protocol.

Once the files enter the Pentium machine, they are distilled quite quickly. "The Distiller runs about six to eight hours," said Cooper, to handle a normal day's 200 pages (there are few common pages among the six newspapers, excepting classified).

The resulting PDF files are moved to a directory monitored by Acrobat Cataloger; the program runs on a standard '486 66 MHz PC with 16 megabytes of RAM. "Actually, we just recycled an old PC," said Cooper.

It takes about 30 minutes to index every word of an entire day's 200-plus pages.

But even compressed and indexed, the files take up quite a bit of space. What to do with them?

"CDs seemed like a good way to store the files," said Cooper. "If you believe Kodak," he said, the theoretical shelf life of a CD-ROM is 100 years.

Alameda Newspapers acquired a CD recorder from Phillips and has been getting the best blank CDs it can find for about $10.50 each, in lots of 100.

The newspaper group gets about six days of all five titles on a CD; a backup CD is made and put in a secure location.

The papers started saving indexed PDF files of every page on Dec. 7, 1994.

But then they found a problem.

With all the text on a page indexed, it was difficult, if not impossible, to find a specific ad. Then Cooper realized that if all the text on a page was indexed, why not print the ad number in 5-point type in the ad's margin?

This solved the problem of finding a specific ad, and at this point, no advertiser has complained.

"The retail world lives by numbers," said Cooper. "Maybe they just understand."

Next week: How to get the ads back.

Onward.

\dmc

[THE COLE DIGEST is written by consultant David M. Cole, editor and publisher of the industry newsletter THE COLE PAPERS. The DIGEST is made available to PressLink subscribers every Wednesday at no extra charge. Send comments by e-mail to cole@plink.geis.com. The COLE DIGEST is the property of The Cole Group, a California sole proprietorship. Reproduction in whole or in part without the written permission of The Cole Group is prohibited. Copyright (C) 1996, The Cole Group. Opinions expressed are those of The Cole Group, unless otherwise noted.

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