Product Reviews

After a seemingly endless development period, the most significant upgrade to the graphic designer's tool of choice is imminent. With the years of anticipation at an end, the program's thousands of fans will now be able to find out if Quark has been spending its energy and resources wisely - and they will be relieved to hear that the answer is a resounding yes.

With version 4.0, Quark has developed a product that accurately meets users' needs while allowing them to work in a way they are familiar with. As well as introducing most of the features layout artists have long been crying out for, the upgrade incorporates many functions that have, up to now, only been available via third-party extensions.

Interface

Rather than a totally new look, Quark has made subtle changes to XPress's interface, which should please long-time users. But although the toolbar looks the same (no trendy 3D buttons here), it contains many new tools. The tools are arranged in a similar fashion to those in version 3.32, but tabbed dialog boxes have been introduced, grouping similar functions into a single window. In version 3.32 you had to work through several dialog boxes to modify items, but XPress 4.0 has collected all the relevant items - such as frames, text, boxes and runaround - into one tabbed box.

Font and Picture Usage have also been combined into a tabbed Usage dialog box. This displays much more information about items such as file size, PostScript name and version for fonts, and dimensions and colours for pictures. You can now zoom up to 800%, rather than its previous versions' 400%, which makes working with very precise layouts much easier.

Tools

Many of the best new features can be found in the new toolbar. All the old favourites are still present, but a series of pop-out toolbars greatly extend the range of functions.

One of the most requested features - Bezier drawing tools for text and picture boxes - has made its way into version 4.0. This means that users now have the same basic controls over the creation of complex shapes as in dedicated drawing packages like FreeHand or Illustrator. It's bound to take some people a while to get used to drawing with Bezier handles, but the ability to create boxes of any shape is long overdue.

You can edit individual points via handles and alter the transition mode in the Measurements palette. The transition option changes the way a line passes through a point. The three buttons that appear in the Measurements palette allow symmetrical, smooth and corner transitions. In symmetrical transitions curve handles remain equidistant from the control point and revolve together. The smooth transition option forces the handles to move around the point together to produce a smooth curve, while the corner option makes the point act like a hinge.

The use of Bezier curves has been extended to the line tools, as these now form part of another much-requested feature - text on a path. A mainstay of many illustration packages, it enables you to flow type on a curve.

XPress remembers the last tool that was used in any of the pop-out bars and leaves that tool in the main bar until a new one is selected, and it's possible to customise the main toolbar to display tools found in pop-outs by pressing the control key when selecting them.

Prior to version 4.0 it was impossible to anchor non-rectangular-shaped boxes. Round or polygonal boxes were converted to the nearest sized rectangle as soon as they were anchored. The introduction of Bezier boxes is complemented by the ability to anchor any element (including lines) into text without losing its shape.

Boxing clever

There's still a difference between text and picture boxes in version 4.0, but you now have much more control over how they operate and you can convert boxes from one type to another. This is useful if, for example, you have created a complex Bezier text box and want to use the same shape to contain a picture.

The formation of boxes has been further enhanced with the ability to create boxes from text. This is sure to lead to some horrific designs, but converting text to paths can be very useful for items such as logos. However, this option is not as developed as it is in illustration packages, as you are restricted to converting only one line of text, and XPress creates an outline copy of the text rather than converting the text itself.

A new Merge command in the Item menu gives even more control over how boxes can be used. As its name suggests, Merge allows the user to control how boxes are combined using Boolean operations. Simple addition or subtraction operations (as well as more complex options such as difference, reverse difference or intersection) are all available.

The Union operation allows different boxes to act as one. In the case of picture boxes, an imported image will show within a number of boxes treated with the Union operation as though they were a series of holes in the paper.

The Split command is the opposite to Merge and has two main options: All Paths and Outside Path. The Outside Path option splits each element or character into separate boxes; the All Path option has the same effect but creates two overlapping boxes for characters with interiors, such as an 'O'.

Clipping paths Anyone dealing with complex layouts will be fully aware of the fun that can be had with clipping paths and runarounds in XPress 3.32. Clipping paths determine which areas of an image will be displayed in XPress and which areas will appear transparent. Runaround determines how text interacts with pictures and other text items. The two are closely related and now both appear as tabs in the Modify dialog box.

To use clipping paths in version 3.32, you had to use Adobe Photoshop, because you couldn't produce or edit paths within XPress. In version 4.0 you can generate clipping paths entirely within XPress.

The preview area not only displays a thumbnail of the image, but also shows the clipping path as a green line and the picture bounds

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in blue. A Type pop-up menu controls how XPress creates clipping paths. These options work best in images with high contrast, and for complex paths you'll still need to use Photoshop. The embedded path option gives XPress users access to clipping paths created elsewhere. Once the image has been placed within a document, the path can be edited without the need to go back to another application. XPress 4.0 will now read clipping paths within TIFF files as well as EPS files.

The same level of control is available for runarounds, with similar options. Text can now be run inside holes in picture boxes, for example. A new option in the Text tab of the Modify dialog is the 'Run Text Around All Sides' check box. This enables text to flow around both sides of an item that is placed in a text box or column. Up to version 3.32 you had to cheat by using two text boxes to achieve this effect. As this is an attribute of the text box, not the item, the text will flow around any item in the way.

A Live Refresh option is now available in the Application Preferences which allows you to see text reflow around objects as they are placed in, or next to, areas of text. The refresh can be set to work instantly or with a time delay. To achieve the latter, the mouse button must be held down over an object before it becomes active.

Dots and dashes Borders in 3.32 were pretty dull. Version 4.0 offers more variety in the form of a Dashes and Stripes dialog box. You can have two types of dashes: proportional or absolute. The length of a proportional pattern will vary with the width of the item it is framing, while an absolute pattern will remain constant with clipping at the end. Various options are available for endcaps and miters as well as control over repeats. Stripes have similar controls, making them very easy to create.

Style sheets Document management has been much improved. A major new feature that has not yet been totally finalised is Character style sheets to supplement the current Paragraph styles found in version 3.32.

Character styles can be applied to text within paragraphs without affecting the overall paragraph style. To create a Character style sheet, you simply choose Character from the New button in the Style Sheet dialog box. This displays the Edit Character style sheet box where you can specify the font, style and size. Both Character and Paragraph style sheets are closely integrated making finer control over type styles more accessible. Keyboard short-cuts can be assigned to styles.

The style sheet window is split into paragraph and character details. This can become confusing as every Paragraph style has to have an associated Character style sheet. However, additional character styles can be created without the need for a paragraph host. The problem comes when you want to delete Character style sheets as you have no easy way of knowing if you are removing a style needed by a paragraph.

Appending items

Most XPress users will use the Append function at some time or another to add items such as colours or style sheets to their documents. The problem with doing this as it stands is that the process is non-selective. If you choose to append the style sheets of one document to the one you're working on, you end up with all its style sheets - the same is true of colours. With version 4.0, Quark provides a means to control this process via the Append option in the File menu. The option to append from the Edit dialog boxes is still there, but it allows the selective choice of which items to import. The tabbed palette controls the import of colours, style sheets, H&Js, dashes and stripes as well as lists for any XPress document.

The Available list shows all the items that it is possible to import. Highlighting an item and clicking the arrow moves it to the Include list, which contains the items that will be imported. To avoid any possible naming conflicts, items can be set to automatically rename in the case of duplicates, or they can prompt users to discard the existing or new item or manually rename it.

Long documents Long document publishing has never been one of XPress's strong points, with this area being dominated by Adobe PageMaker and the high-end Adobe FrameMaker. At present, XPress-users often split long documents into several sections to make working easier and faster. Managing this is difficult as page numbering and indexing has to be done manually. XTensions are available for these purposes as well as table of contents generation, but they can prove expensive.

Version 4.0 adds features to make long documents easier to produce and manage. The Lists feature creates a list of document items and their locations. This can be used for a table of contents or list of figures, and you can attach an unlimited number of lists to a document.

You can now create a 'book' in XPress. A book is displayed as a palette that contains links to individual documents, known as chapters. Chapters can be added, deleted or moved within a book. The first chapter added to a book becomes the master chapter, acting in a similar way to a master page in a document. A Synchronise button applies the master chapter's style sheets, H&Js, colours and dash styles to all the other chapters.

The final tool for long documents is the Index palette. This lets you add words to an index at four levels, determining the scope of references and cross-referencing. While the Index palette is open, index markers are displayed in the document as coloured brackets. A sort field can be used to override alphabetical sorting of entries. This is useful for placing items starting with numerals within the body of the index ('2' under 'two', for example) rather than at the top, as would be the case with a straight alphabetical list.

Joyful XPression

Quark has got rid of a number of irritating items, such as the tab and paragraph limit. Other improvements include support for thousands of style sheets, colours and H&Js. With version 4.0 you can save files as version 3.32, removing the need for everyone to upgrade, as was the case with the last major upgrade. The addition of an XTension manager will help those who have XTensions they only use with certain documents, allowing them to save sets of XTensions as well as decide which will load when XPress is launched.

Version 4.0 has definitely been worth the wait and should consolidate XPress as the industry-standard DTP package. It also seems likely to be available for 68K Macs, which will help extend the lifespan of Quadras. Shipping dates and pricing have not been released, but it's worth starting to save your pennies.