[yally04]

Hi,

I'm having kind of a huge problem with Quark Passport, and if you can believe it, it's not Quark's fault!

The short version: The printer can't open the Quark 6 Passport files we sent them. So I think what I'll have to do is buy a normal version of Quark 6 and copy and paste. My main question is, would this work?

Did this work between v.4 and 5? I don't really have the money for this, but the project will die without working software so I think this is the only way.

Still, the other option is to find someone who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and has time to let me borrow their computer, which must have Quark Passport v.5 or 6 installed.

See below for an email address.


The long version, which explains why downloaded software sucks:

I'm an editor (responsible for writing, not design) for a brand new magazine, working with volunteers and semi-professionals (mostly recent college graduates) to put this 84 page thing together. The problem we're having is that someone in layout was sick of using Quark 5 in classic mode, since Photoshop, Illustrator, and the like are all in OS X, and this person found a pre-release version of Quark Passport online. I happened to be out of the country for the summer when this happened, and since I'm the resident computer guru no one was aware that there were potentially huge problems.

Now I'm back, they laid the whole magazine out in Quark 6 Passport, and our printer can't open any of our files. They don't have the software, and even if they did I don't think it would work--the Passport 6 demo can't open our files without crashing. But downgraded v.5 files open without a problem. On top of this, the Passport 6 pre-release doesn't have the option of outputting files in single-language format (this is the source of the problem), which would have been compatible, nor will it output usable EPS or PDF files (it's pre-release after all). And of course, I can't downgrade past Passport v.5, which is no help at all since no one has Passport 5.

So since we just can't drop $1500 on a good version of Passport, I need to find another way to deal with this without redoing the whole thing. I think my options are the following:

1) Find someone in the San Francisco Bay Area who has Passport v.5 or 6 and who would be willing to let me use their computer to resave all the files in the normal, single-language Quark format.

2) Buy a normal version of Quark 6 and hope that copying and pasting from one to the other will work.

If you live in the Bay Area and can help me out, please email me at quarkhelp (at) robinkraft (dot) fastmail (dot) fm

If you can counsel me on copying and pasting into Quark 6, including whether or not this would actually work, please email me as well, or post to the forum.

If you think I have any other options, I'm open to suggestions.

We should have been printing a week ago, so I'd love any help ASAP.

Also, InDesign is not an option right now. I'm sure looking into it for future issues though!

Thanks.

[iT4c0]

try ask in www.prepressforums.com
there are a lot of knowledgeable printer or prpress people and they will help you on this one. Good luck.

[gadster]

Hint: pdf is your friend. (Or 'Save as eps')

[spiznet]

Use a service bureau that has Quark 6. Let them open it.

[sandsl]

Files made in the QuarkXPress 6 Passport Beta crash when opening in QuarkXPress 6 Passport Final.

Anyone like to try and figure out how to turn beta files to final files?

[buchrob]

Passport has traditionally been a different beast altogether.

Some service providers (after investing thousands in "normal" Quark, with the growing pains associated) may be reluctant to make the extra investment in Passport, and may just offhandedly say that the "file is defective" because they can't open it.

As to the beta version crashing the release version, that's nothing new for Quark or anyone else, but saying that the person who used beta software to do an important project is an !@#$% won't get you out of this bind either.

Your best bet is to use Acrobat and create PDF's one page at a time. If you are then stuck to edit, you will be limited the traditional Illustrator/Photoshop tools, but that beats trying to cut-and-paste and with the reflows that are SURE to happen between Passport and Quark.

[godzookie2k]

print your document to disk (postscript files) and run them through distiller. PDF is your friend, and thats how you should be shipping to press anyway. I hope you fired the employee. Using pirated, AND prerelease software in a production environment is not only supid and costly, but risking your company's future via a lawsuit getting slapped on you from quark (since you posted this to a public message board)

[Prepress Online]

I haven't worked in Passport in Quark 6 - -had problems I rember in 4.0, When you do a save as - -isn;t there another option to save the Quark file out in another version beside passport -- there was this option in 4.0 passport.