What is APP?

This was written in October 2009

Arbortext Advanced Print Publisher (APP, formerly Advent 3B2) is a commercial typesetting software application. Specifically, it is a high-end print composition engine, and an Arbortext product made by the Parametric Technology Corporation|PTC. APP is a rules-based engine which allows the Style sheet (desktop publishing)|stylesheet builder to fully automate page make-up tasks and run them in a 'lights out' server mode.

APP is originally developed by a company called Advent Publishing Systems, Ltd., based in Swindon, UK. Advent Publishing was founded in 1986 and is headquartered in Swindon, United Kingdom with additional offices in United States and Germany. Later Advent become a subsidiary of arbortext, Inc. and Arbrotext is now coming under the Parametric Technology Corporation|PTC. Arbortext business unit under PTC designs, develops, and markets publishing software.

Introduction
A typesetting software is a software which is designed to work based on a formatted stylesheet to create output for print media. The stylesheet is a set of rules that design the layout, typography color schemes for a print media product. There are many software available under the category of typesetting application. Currently the following software packages are having much of the popularity in the industry.
 * Adobe Indesign
 * Quark Xpress
 * Arbortext Advanced Print Publisher aka APP
 * XML Professional Publisher aka XPP
 * Microsoft word
 * TeX/LaTeX

Looking at the above list most of these software are WYSIWIG. You can import your data, illustrations and color schemes to the typesetting application and you can make your formatted output. Each of the above software having different types of commands or user interaction system. Microsoft word is often called as a Office Automation Package rather than a typesetting application. TeX/LaTeX is working with an entirely different methodology. In simple it is a typesetting programming language and each of your output have to be compiled for obtaining in final output format.

APP is standout in the above list with a completely different platform for typesetting. APP can accept both structured or unstructured data. In another way APP is also a publishing programming language which not need to be compiled every time when you are obtaining an output. As for a programming language, APP have its own macro keywords and commands and scripting system. APP also accept other scripting languages such as Perl and Javascript.

APP is a publishing toolbox wrapped around a core page composition engine. It claims to support chevron delimited mark-up such as SGML, XML, HTML, has a macro and scripting language, and uses a number of established technologies such as Perl, XPath, and Unicode.

History

 * Mid-1980s: Advent Publishing Systems create 3B2, a desktop publishing application. 3B2 gained a reputation as a challenger for Quark (software)|Quark, but was soon eclipsed by that product in the DTP world and evolved into the high end automation market. The name 3B2 comes from the business park in Swindon (UK) that Advent had its offices at the time.
 * Early 2000s: Advent integrate more XML technologies into 3B2, allowing users to associate formatting with XML hierarchies
 * 2004: Advent Publishing Systems is purchased by Arbortext to provide a more powerful alternative to its FOSI/TeX engine
 * 2005: Arbortext purchased by Parametric Technology Corporation|PTC to provide technical documentation capabilities in its product lifecycle management tools

Licensing
PTC make Arbortext Advanced Print Publisher available under a commercial license on a per-cpu basis. The PTC web site does not give specific pricing information.

As of at mid-5.4 release, APP was included as an alternative rendering engine in Arbortext Publishing Engine. As of 6.0, it is the default rendering engine, replacing FOSI.

Uses
APP has traditionally been used for a number of specific typesetting tasks.
 * Scientific Technical and Medical Journal Publishing, particularly in India. APP's automation, SGML/XML handling and mathematics formatting mean this difficult layout task can be automated}
 * Financial typesetting, particularly generation of Edgar reports for Securities and Exchange Commission filings
 * Government reports such as Hansard, daily journals and other reports.

Technologies
APP applies text and page formatting properties in a proprietary language based on SGML mark-up. APP 'templates' are stylesheets which comprise page layouts, text formatting styles and scripting. Scripting is used to automate the publishing process using 'Macro (computer science)|macros', which are low-level system commands. When using XML, a template can employ XPath to specify the exact conditions to which style is applied.

Principal outputs are PostScript and PDF, although APP also provides a number of alternative output drivers. APP provides a WYSIWYG view of pages in the Desktop version, which can be used to manipulate pages after automated composition, or to build templates.

Publishing with APP
When you are creating a print publishing product, your starting point will be creating a stylesheet. APP will enable you to create a dynamic stylesheet which will render the output in different way according to your structured data inputs. In another way, the APP stylesheet you can design in such a way that it is driven by the data. The inbuilt scripting system will help you to create a suitable workflow to create the formatted output. It can be either fully automated or an interactive workflow based on your stylesheet's specifications.

APP has two working modes. The basic mode is interactive mode in which you can edit the formatted output. The Black Box mode is a fully automated mode where you will not be able to edit while creating the formatted output. The Black Box Mode will help you to create the print products like books, journals, technical specifications, financial documents, etc. quickly and with less man power.