Configuring import of Content Station HTML articles with Smart Connection

When a HTML article that was created in Content Station is opened for placing in InDesign or is opened for editing in InCopy, the article needs to be converted to an InCopy format.

This conversion is handled by a Server plug-in named 'InCopy HTML Conversion' and is based on a template file.

Templates

The templates are files in .wwcx format and contain definitions for the article components, paragraph styles and character styles.

They are stored in the following location:

<Enterprise Server path>/config/articletemplates/

A default template named 'ihcdefault.wwcx' is shipped with Enterprise Server and is used as the default template for all Brands.

Setting up a Brand-specific template

Instead of using a default template for all Brands, it is also possible to assign a template for a particular Brand.

Step 1. Use the default ihcdefault.wwcx file as the starting point for creating a new template, and give it a descriptive name.

Step 2. Access the componentDefs.xml file.

Step 3. Between the <brands> </brands> tags, define a new Brand as follows:

<brand id="id number">
   <template url="articletemplates/template name.wwcx">
</brand>

Step 4. Replace "id number" by the Brand ID:

Step 5. Replace "template name.wwcx" by the name of the template that was created in step 1.

Step 6. Save the file.

The merging process

During the merging process, the InCopy HTML Conversion Server plug-in will take the article created in Content Station and compare it with the predefined template.

The merging process can be described as follows:

1. The article components (body, head, intro, and so on) are compared against the components within the template.

• If the component’s Element label matches a component’s Element label within the template, the text within that article component will be merged into the matching component.

Example: The Content Station article contains a component labeled 'head'. The article template also contains a component labeled 'head'. In the new article, a component is therefore created labeled 'head' containing the content from the Content Station article component that is labeled 'head'.

• If the component’s Element label matches none of the component’s Element labels within the template, any available component without Element label will be used.

Example: The Content Station article contains a component labeled 'caption'. None of the components in the article template are labeled 'caption' but it does contain an unlabeled component. In the new article, an unlabeled component is therefore created containing the content from the Content Station article component that is labeled 'caption'.

• If there are no components without an Element label available, a component with the Element label 'body' will be used.

Example: The Content Station article contains a component labeled 'caption'. None of the components in the article template are labeled 'caption', no unlabeled components are available, but a component labeled 'body' is available. In the new article, a component labeled 'body' is therefore created containing the content from the Content Station article component that is labeled 'caption'.

• If there are no components with the Element label 'body' available, the very first component will be used regardless of its Element label.

Example: The Content Station article contains a component labeled 'caption'. None of the components in the article template are labeled 'caption', no unlabeled components are available, and no component labeled 'body' is available. The first component in the template is labeled 'head'. In the new article, a component labeled 'head' is therefore created containing the content from the Content Station article component that is labeled 'caption'.

2. The paragraph and character styles within the matched components are matched against the predefined styles in the template.

• If the article component has a paragraph style or character style that matches a style of the same name within the template component (paragraph or character), the style will be used.
• If the article component does not have a paragraph style or character style that matches a style of the same name within the template component (paragraph or character), the style will be matched against the template document styles.
• If no suitable style definition within the template document style definitions has been found, the style will be ignored.