Quark Inc. has announced that its upcoming release of QuarkXPress 7 will be built on JDF (Job Definition Format), the latest XML-based open standard used in the publishing industry. JDF provides a way for settings to travel with a job file as it moves through a publishing system, and QuarkXPress 7 will implement that standard with the Quark Job Jacket, which will place all workflow and prepress information directly in the project file.
The Quark Job Jacket will contain contact information for the people working on the project, resources required, layout settings, output specifications and more. Changes made to one Job Jacket will reflect in all projects that use that Jacket, and all of the Job Jacket elements can be mapped to JDF elements and vice-versa.
QuarkXPress 7 will also support Personalized Print Markup Language (PPML), which recognizes all static content, multiple instances of the same static content, synchronized content and master page elements as reusable objects. PPML will enable QuarkXPress 7 to be used as a tool for creating personalized materials based on variable data.
In addition, Quark has created QuarkXPress Markup Language (QXML), a DOM schema that defines a projectis structure according to W3C DOM and XPath specifications. This will enable developers to easily access, update and create QuarkXPress project elements.
Other new features coming in the upgrade include new transparency options for specifying the opacity of elements as well as support for native Photoshop transparency in PSD or TIFF format; new controls for on-screen simulations for soft proofing; expanded access to special characters through Unicode and OpenType support; and more.
Quark did not say when it will ship QuarkXPress 7, nor did it indicate pricing and system requirements.