PersonalEffect Release Notes
See also What’s new in PersonalEffect | Watch a short video overview
Version 13.2.1. (August 20, 2024)
This is a maintenance release that includes various bug fixes and improvements, such as:
- uCreate connectivity proof created compressed output.
- XLIM performance degradation in certain cases.
- In some cases, the record count wasn’t shown in the dashboard.
- Hot folder production failed when copies based on ADORs were used.
- Hot folder split production jobs partially failed.
- Hot folder ignored the imposition “center on pages” setting.
- Hot folder production failed when FTP destination was used.
- Email on demand crashed web services.
- In extreme cases, emails triggered from Circle stay in the “waiting” status.
- InDesign Server unnecessarily opened the web services port.
Version 13.2 (July 4, 2024)
- Added: Support for language in accessible PDFs, which determines in which language the PDF is read by a screen reader.
- Added: You can now create a secure PDF. Using a permissions password, you can restrict users from printing, editing, and copying content in the PDF.
- Added: uProduce now supports Windows domain authentication, allowing user management via the domain active directory. This enables centralized user management, improved security, a simplified authentication process and consistency across systems.
- Enhancement: When connecting to a data source in uCreate, the order of the records appearing in the data source is preserved, without the need to sort them by primary field.
- Added: Two new GetEnv functions have been added:
- TopMostJobId – Returns the job ID, or in case of a turbo job, the job ID of the parent job.
- RecipientFilter – Returns the recipient filter used in production, which is either the table name, plan filter name or query.
- Enhancement: QLingo Skip Operator is now supported for VDP production on uCreate on the desktop.
- Enhancement: All installers and binaries are now signed. This includes installers for uProduce, uPlan, and uCreate (both Windows and Mac).
- Enhancements: This version includes security enhancements, such as the upgrade of 3rd party libraries.
- Deprecated: WS API SDK has been deprecated, and version 13.1 is the final release for the WS API SDK.
- Support for the WS API (excluding the SDK) will continue.
- The REST API is now the official API for uProduce.
- Fixed: Various bug fixes and improvements, such as:
- XLIM font kerning
- Tab delimited files
- Suppress empty tables
-
Barcodes & rectangle within a dynamic table
-
uCreate Generate VDP “All” selection
Version 13.1.1 (April 10, 2024)
- This is a maintenance release that includes various bug fixes.
- Fixed Mac installer.
Version 13.1 (March 31, 2024)
- Added: uCreate usability enhancements
- Content objects and variables can be organized into groups.
- The order of content objects, variables, and input data fields can be rearranged.
- Content objects, variables and input data fields can be sorted by name, type or group.
- Values of input data samples are shown in the Dynamic Content panel.
- Default copy fitting settings can be defined for the “Dynamic Story Copy Fit” dialog box.
- Default print settings can be defined for the “Dynamic Print” dialog box.
- Ability to multi-select elements in a document and apply to them at once dynamic properties.
- Menus and context menus have been reorganized.
- Keyboard shortcuts are better named and grouped.
- uCreate menus can be customized.
- Added: Capabilities in uCreate connectivity
- Production can trigger an email notification when the printing job completes.
- Ability to set the resolution of a PNG or JPG in proof and print.
An “Auto” option, which calculates the best online display resolution based on the InDesign document size, has also been added. - Free text comments can be added when printing a job.
- Ability to copy the print output file to a specific destination.
- Added: Dashboard and API enhancements
- There is no longer a need to choose the data source type as part of the upload process.
- A new type of user – system administrator – has been added to the system, to manage high-level system tasks such as maintenance, system-level configuration and licensing.
- Administrators are now dedicated to managing users and production resources.
- Administrators can access the same options as the non-admin user.
- Administrators possess the capability to impersonate an existing user, enabling them to take on the identity of that user within the system.
- It is possible to have multiple administrators and system administrators in the system.
- GDPR:
- New GDPR Rest APIs.
- New “GDPR” section in the dashboard.
- GDPR tasks are recorded in the job center.
- Ability to prevent jobs that contain on-demand links from being deleted, so that PDF links are available beyond the GDPR cleanup period.
- Tracking data cleanup maintenance options have been added to the Rest API and dashboard.
- All proxy configurations have been consolidated into one “Proxy Configuration” section.
- A “System Settings” area has been added for the system administrator, where system-level configurations can be set.
- All administrator configurations have been consolidated into a “Global Settings” area, where it is possible to configure:
- Email notifications
- Access to monitoring tools
- Strong password policy
- Login settings (the duration of the user’s login token)
- In the dashboard, only single popup windows are opened now.
- New user preferences options have been added:
- Open simultaneously multiple pop-up windows
- Determine the maximum number of characters to show
- Determine whether the resubmit will use the range of the sub-job and not of the original job range
- Enhancement: Security features
- Upgrade of 3rd party libraries.
- Password encryption of dashboard components (such as FTP).
- HTML encoding for relevant data.
- Stack trace isn’t shown in error messages.
- Dashboard login always uses a token.
- User is instructed to change the default installation password.
- Additional security when creating or editing a user in the dashboard.
- Deprecated:
- uPlan VC project has been stopped and fully deleted.
- Exact Target project has been fully deleted.
- Specialty imaging has been deprecated.
- Fixes: Various bug fixes and improvements, such as:
- Show entity Id in dashboard entity details.
- Better logs for thread naming and times.
- Assets with content samples.
- Rectangle function fixes.
Version 13.0 (December 3, 2023)
- Added: Support for latest release of Adobe CC-2024.
Notes:- The new InDesign Page Show/Hide feature is not supported, and will be ignored during production.
- Adobe InDesign Server CC-2024 is not supported on Windows Server 2016.
- Added: Support for macOS Sonoma (version 14).
- Added: The new Hot Folder feature enables to configure a folder that is continuously monitored, and when files are copied or dropped into it, they are automatically processed. This feature allows to trigger document production by simply dropping a recipient list file into a hot folder, resulting in output for that recipient list.
In addition, this feature is designed with a plug-in option that allows developers to create other useful hot folder tasks.
The hot folder is a paid optional add-on which replaces the Hot Submit plugin created by XMPie Professional Services. If you have purchased this plug-in from the Professional Services team, contact support to get your free license for the new built-in version. The Hot Submit plugin created by XMPie Professional Services will reach its end of life in January 1st, 2025. - Added: New input data field samples.
Designers can now create input data field samples, and then browse through the different values to see how they display in the document. The input data samples behave like a data source, and any rules in the content object/variables will be applied to the sample values. In addition, it is possible to generate output using the input samples. - Enhancement: Working with content object samples has been made simpler.
- Added: It is now possible to have a full workflow without any data source (“None” data source), including in the dashboard and connectivity.
- Added: The XLIM composition engine has been updated to support PNG image assets, including support for PNG transparency.
- Added: It is now possible to have the production trigger an email notification when it finishes. You can configure the email notification in the dashboard:
- Notification settings at the system level.
- Notification settings at the account level (if not configured, the information will be taken from the system level).
- Notification settings at the campaign level (if not configured, the information will be taken from the account level).
- Added: It is now also possible to set the resolution of a PNG and JPG on the process page, as is the case of the proof page.
- Added: An “Auto” option for PNG and JPG resolution has been added. It calculates the best online display resolution based on the InDesign document size.
- Added: Free text comments can now be set when processing a job. These comments will be included in the job center’s details area, and in the triggered email when the job completes.
- Added: Some additional maintenance capabilities to help the admin user keep the server running smoothly have been added to the dashboard’s Maintenance area. These include:
- Clean production cache artifacts
- Clean plan parts (such as uImage) cache output
- Delete plan parts (such as uImage) cache data that is older than a specified number of days
- Clean plan downloaded URL content cache artifacts
- Delete plan downloaded URL content cache data that is older than a specified number of days
- Added: Additions to the uProduce REST API:
- OnDemand PDF
- Licensing
- System Settings
- Ports (suspend/resume)
- Plan Parts configuration
- Faster job submit request
- New endpoints for the hot folder feature
- Enhancement: The REST API now fully covers all uProduce functionalities and capabilities, and is more featured than the old web services API. It is recommended to use the REST API going forward.
- Added: In uCreate Print, it is now possible to select multiple text or graphic frames and apply the page numbering text, barcode or visibility features to all the selected frames at once.
- Fixes: Various bug fixes and improvements, such as:
- Added script to expose the dashboard and API endpoints via a proxy server.
- Dashboard user management section moved to admin settings.
- Newer SQL LocalDB version and stabler installation of this component.
- Upgraded image converter components.
- Upgraded version of SQL Server OLE DB Driver.
- Email jobs with zero recipients no longer fail the job.
- APIs are no longer sensitive to the server’s locale configuration.
Version 12.4 (December 3, 2023)
- Continuous support for Adobe CC-2023.
- All other new features of version 13.0 are applicable to this version.
Version 12.2 (June 27, 2023)
- Added: A new page numbering controlling page visibility feature lets you define whether a page in your design will or will not be visible, depending on the specific page-numbering logic that you set. Read more | Video training
- Added: XLIM now honors RGB color swatches.
- Added: uChart now honors RGB color swatches.
- Added: Digital PDF accessibility.
From now on, when you produce an Interactive PDF or Adobe PDF using the “Separate files for each recipient” option (or you process only a single record), the output will include InDesign-supported accessibility features, such as tag information. - Added: The uProduce dashboard now includes new maintenance options which are designed to help you with server maintenance tasks, such as SQL server maintenance and deletion of unneeded server objects. Read more | Knowledge base article
- Added: Ability to mark data sources as “not permanent”, even when GDPR is not enabled.
- Added: Support for Apple Silicon M2 chip.
- Deprecated: The Filler page production option is now deprecated and replaced by the new “Page numbering – page visibility” option. It will continue to work, but we recommend that you move to this new option.
- Fixes: Various bug fixes and improvements, such as:
- Dashboard security and performance enhancements.
- uCreate Excel usage issues, when an Excel file is opened in MS Excel.
- uCreate panel vs. document preview discrepancies.
- In uCreate, it is possible to control the number of InDesign server instances used during turbo production.
- Important! Type 1 fonts are no longer supported in Adobe apps, specifically in InDesign version 18.2 and above. See PostScript Type 1 fonts end of support.
Version 12.1.1. (June 1, 2023)
- This is a maintenance release that includes various bug fixes.
Version 12.1 (March 30, 2023)
- Added: New PDF/VT-3 variable data format is now available in uCreate Print and uProduce. Video training
- Added: Ability to start working on your document and make it fully dynamic before connecting to a data source. Read more
- Added: The uCreate Print user interface has significantly changed to improve usability Video training:
- Clickable large button to start adding dynamic content to the document.
- The creation of new content objects, variables and input data fields has been redesigned to simplify the process of creating these objects.
- The task of editing a rule now has its own dedicated rule editor.
- It is now possible to highlight in the document only selected content objects.
- Ability to select multiple pages and apply dynamic properties to them at the same time.
- You can now set the output resolution of a PNG and JPEG proof jobs in connectivity mode.
- The panel can be resized to the full height of the screen.
- The panel can be scrolled using the mouse wheel.
- The dial indication automatically moves to the variable when a dial content object is turned to a variable.
- Improved organization of the Preferences dialog.
- Ability to turn a link content object into a variable.
- Ability to select the save location for the document structure file.
- Improved icon design.
- New advanced capability to embed and extract a plan into or out of the InDesign document.
- Added: Ability to sort table records by the primary field configured in the plan.
- Added: When producing a job using flat data, you can now use filtering to filter the data. Video training
- Added: Ability to generate flat data directly from the plan and data source.
- Added: New compression and asset collection options for proof set and flat data creation.
- Added: Ability to resubmit a job directly from the job center, preserving the job’s configuration.
- Added: Ability to control the number of InDesign server instances used during turbo production.
- Added: Additions to the uProduce REST API. Video training
- Document structure
- Plan object dependencies
- Delivery provider send
- XES delivery provider verified senders
- XES delivery provider status details
- Data source CSV upload options
- Append data source tables
- Port operations
- Tracking
- Campaign changes
- Jobs
- Port operations
- Add events
- Export events
- Flattened queries
- Clone entities
- Data sources
- Asset sources
- Documents
- Campaigns
- Added: Support for SQL Server 2022.
- Fixes: Various bug fixes and improvements, such as:
- Better handling of uImage smart objects.
- uCreate find and replace.
- Dashboard security.
- Improved port error descriptions.
Version 12.0.1 (December 6, 2022)
- This is a minor release that addresses uStore internal functionality.
Version 12.0 (November 17, 2022 )
- Added: Support for Adobe CC-2023 only.
- Added: Direct mail enhancements of version 11.3 are now supported also for XLIM.
- Added: Support for macOS Ventura (version 13).
- Fixed: Various bug fixes and improvements.
Version 11.4 (November 17, 2022 )
- This is the last version that supports Adobe CC-2022.
- Added: Direct mail enhancements of version 11.3 are now supported also for XLIM.
- Added: Support for macOS Ventura (version 13).
- Fixed: Various bug fixes and improvements.
Version 11.3 (September 29, 2022)
- Added: Direct mail enhancements. For customers who do direct mail or transactional work, the uProduce server includes new features to help manage mail output which includes a different number of pages per recipient. These include creating a flat ADOR data file in addition to your chosen VDP output format, using the flat ADOR data as a data source, and using the new Preflight output format.
- Added: The uCreate Print user interface has significantly changed to help improve usability.
- Added: A new analysis method that analyzes the full structure of the document has been added. The result of this analysis is an XML file that accompanies the document in its full life cycle.
- Added: The following new API methods have been added:
– Ticket templates
– Mail templates
– Destinations
– Delivery providers
– Population management
– Input fields customization
– No data source production
– UI control (visibility and theme) - Added: Support for AWS S3 as a destination target.
- Enhancement: Log files are now aggregated daily to reduce their number.
- Change: Microsoft Compact SQL has reached its end-of-life and is being replaced by SQL Server Express LocalDB.
- Change: Missing recipient fields in the data source are now treated as null (empty values) instead of failing the job.
- Change: From now on, only a single InDesign version will be supported per XMPie version. This version supports Adobe CC-2022 only.
- Fixed: Various bug fixes and improvements, such as:
– Latest Mac OS issues
– uCreate connectivity preview invalid line feeds
– XLIM preflight XNIP errors
– IIR for barcodes issuesep
Version 11.2.2 (June 13, 2022)
- This is a maintenance release that includes various bug fixes.
Version 11.2.1 (May 23, 2022)
- This is a maintenance release that includes various bug fixes.
Version 11.2 (May 8, 2022)
Watch a short video overview
- Added: The Page numbering feature is now supported also for XLIM documents.
- Enhancement: The ability to use run information in page numbering has been added. For example, “Run Page Index” and “Run Record Index”.
Read more | Video training - Added: Support for Adobe Typekit fonts.
- Added: New QLingo functions: Fetch, AsJsonArray.
- Added: New REST API functionality: Port management.
- Deprecated: File-system asset source with authentication.
- Fixed: Various bug fixes and improvements, such as:
– Job doesn’t fail on zero recipients.
– Improved uCreate Import CPKG process.
Version 11.1 (January 9, 2022)
- Added: Windows Search Indexing.
When using the file system asset source type, it is now possible to use Windows Indexing to improve search performance.
This is especially useful in cases when the file system asset source contains many folders and subfolders. During production, searching these folders may take a long time and could thus affect asset-resolving performance. If you observe poor performance when searching for asset files, it is advisable to use Windows Indexing. Read article
Note that this feature is relevant only if your folders contain a large number of files, otherwise, this will result in performance degradation. - Added: PersonalEffect now supports MP4 and MPEG video assets for XM campaigns.
- Enhancement: Options in the uCreate Print panel right-click menu have been modified to allow you to easily carry out common tasks.
- Added: When working in uCreate Print Connectivity mode, it is now possible to create a proof in PNG format to streamline uStore product creation.
- Added: New REST API functionality: Auto Purge jobs.
Jobs can be set to be automatically purged, in which case they are deleted and all traces of them are removed from the system.
The Time to Live (TTL) of the job, which defines how long to keep the job data before it is automatically purged, is configured in the ticket. - Added: Additional performance counters.
- Fixed: Various bug fixes and improvements, such as:
– Issues with anchored text box have been solved.
– PDF on Demand link now works, even if the entire email job has not yet been completed.
– The “Auto convert to nonbreaking spaces and hyphens” option has been returned to uCreate Print.
Version 11.0 (November 28, 2021)
- Added: Support for Adobe CC-2022.
- Added: Support for Apple Silicon (M1).
- Added: Support for macOS Monterey (version 12).
- Added: Support for Windows 11 operating system.
- Added: Support for Windows Server 2022 operating system.
- Fixed: Various bug fixes and improvements.
Version 10.2.1 (October 14, 2021)
- This is a maintenance release that includes various bug fixes.
Version 10.2 (October 1, 2021)
- Enhancement: The performance of the page numbering feature has been significantly improved, and output creation has been optimized (smaller output size and faster RIP).
- Enhancement: The uProduce RESTful API now covers many more functionalities, such as assets, fonts, data sources and cpkg.
- Deprecated: XMPieDotNetLibrary SDK has been deprecated, and is replaced by the RestAPI functionality.
If you’ve used it, replace it with the RestAPI. However, it will still continue working after upgrades, and replacement to the RestAPI can be done at a later stage. - Added: Ability to create InDesign keyboard shortcuts for uCreate Print actions. Video training
- Added: PersonalEffect now supports Web ADORs for use in Circle analytics.
- Experimental: Improvements and bug fixes to XMPie’s uPlan Visual Code extension.
- Fixed: Various bug fixes and improvements.
Version 10.1 (June 30, 2021)
Watch a short video overview
- Added: A new Page Numbering feature has been added, which enables you to create design elements that incorporate page numbering information.
The page numbering information can be formatted using JavaScript logic to display as text or barcode, or to control visibility.
Read more in English Deutsch Français | Video training Added: uProduce RESTful API, which exposes uProduce functionality via REST API calls.
Currently this API is partial and does not cover all uProduce functionalities and capabilities, which will follow later on. This API is fully compatible with the web services API. The two APIs can be used in conjunction to cover the entire range of uProduce functionalities and capabilities.
uProduce RESTful API conforms to the Open API Specification (Swagger) v.2 and v.3, which is used to create API clients such as Postman and Visual Studio. Video training- Experimental: XMPie’s uPlan Visual Code extension.
The uPlan Visual Code extension is used as a plan editor within Visual Code to define advanced business rules and logic for your campaigns. Note that this extension is currently in the experimental phase. Video training - Enhancement: Right-click menu options in the InDesign document are all gathered and organized logically under the “XMPie” menu option.
- Enhancement: New option for automatic formatting of uPlan’s QLingo code, making the code uniform, clean and easy to read. This is especially useful after pasting code.
- Fixed: Various bug fixes.
Version 10.0.2 (March 17, 2021)
- This is a maintenance release that includes various bug fixes.
- This version is the final version that formally supports SQL Server 2014 and lower.
- Support for macOS Big Sur.
Version 10.0.1 (January 17, 2021)
- This is a maintenance release that includes various bug fixes.
- Added: TLS 1.2 is now supported also in Cross Media.
Version 10.0 (November 4, 2020)
- Added: Support for Adobe CC-2021.
- Added: New uPlan search option.
- Enhancement: Changes in the licensing mechanism to support additional database server fail-safe configurations.
- Fixed: Various bug fixes.
Version 9.8.2 (August 24, 2020)
- This is a maintenance release that includes various bug fixes.
- Deprecated: ADOR Core Server (also called Mini Server) is deprecated as of September 1, 2020.
Version 9.8.2 is the final version that contains the ADOR Core Server.
ADOR Core Server features are still supported but are no longer being developed and will no longer be included in future releases.
Support will continue up until September 1, 2021.
Version 9.8.1 (July 19, 2020)
- Added: Due to various security vulnerabilities in Java, uPlan Java has been upgraded to OpenJDK 14, which is also an integral part of uPlan.
When upgrading, former Java (10.0.1) is not automatically uninstalled. It is recommended to uninstall it. - Added: Documentation added for the Web.URLContentAsFile function. Read more
- Fixed: Various bug fixes.
Version 9.8 (June 28, 2020)
- Added: uCreate Print now gives you the ability to select which page and layer of your PDF document will be used in your design.
Read more | Video training
Note that layer data that span multiple content streams are currently not supported. - Added: New QLingo asset handling functions. Read more
- Added: New QLingo function for generating a dynamic color shape. Read more
- Added: Custom JavaScript functions can now directly access uPlan’s built-in functions, or other custom functions. Read more
- Added: Improved support for Australian postal barcodes.
- Added: Optional performance counters in log files.
- Enhancement: uImage server processing stability improvements, including Photoshop unwanted UI disabler.
- Enhancement: Improved query-handling in the Plan Interpreter.
- Fixed: Multiple stability improvements and bug fixes, such as:
- XLIM jobs fail/hung in specific scenarios (140079).
- Imposition produces PDF/VT instead of PDF (140213).
- Cases of incorrect proof of JPG (140153).
- Failure during upload of data source with several tables (139907).
- PDF-on-Demand various issues.
- Issues relating to handling text boxes with tables.
Version 9.7.2 (April 2, 2020)
- This is a maintenance release that includes bug fixes to improve MacOS Catalina stability.
- Added: Support for user selection of both PDF compatibility level and PDF standards compliance.
Version 9.7 (January 15, 2020)
- Added: Support for Adobe CC-2020.
- Added: Support for MacOS 10.15 – Catalina.
Versions earlier than 10.14 are no longer supported. - Added: Custom JavaScript functions can now access the values of various uPlan elements, such as Recipient record values, Variable values and UserView record values.
- Added: New QLingo string function – CleanNumber. This function allows to strip any characters from a string, leaving only digits. This is particularly useful for cleaning up telephone numbers and leaving only digits.
- Added: New QLingo string function – FindByRegExp. This function keeps only the characters matching the definition of the regular expression.
- Added: New GetEnv uPlan function – GetEnv(“SplitPart”). In case of splitting a job, you can get the current split part number.
- Added: It is now possible to change XMPie’s automatic caching mechanism in the output stream, according to which reusable objects such as Graphic ADORs are placed into the output file only once and are referenced for all additional records that use the same object.
Now, if your Graphic or Text File ADOR will be unique for every record in the database, you can disable the caching mechanism by renaming the ADOR object to include .unique at the end of the ADOR name. Similarly, for reusable Text ADORs, it is possible to enable the caching mechanism by adding .reusable at the end of the ADOR object name.
It is recommended that you change this automatic behavior only if you fully understand the caching mechanism, and the impact of the change. - Known issue: Legacy PDF production does not work on uCreate Print for MacOS. You can perform the production on the server.
Previous versions
Sep 1, 2019
July 22, 2019
May 19, 2019
Jan 18, 2019
Nov 27, 2018
Aug 20, 2018
Jul 11, 2018
May 2, 2018
Mar 15, 2018
Nov 9, 2017
Jul 26, 2017
May 29, 2017
Mar 9, 2017