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Old 11-13-2009, 06:30 AM   #1
melaroonie
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Default Printing to the edge of a page (section tabs)

Hello -- This may be a very elementary question, but...

I am currently working on a training manual where each section is marked by rectangular-shaped, labled tabs along the outside edge of the pages. The manual was created in Adobe FrameMaker 7.0 (PC) and the PDF in Distiller 7.0. In the past, I have had trouble getting the page tabs to print flush with the edge of the page. Is there a special way to set up the file and eliminate this issue (maybe set the bleed to 9" x 11" and the crop and trim to 8.5" x 11")? Secondly, must these settings be specified in FM or can they be set in Distiller or Adobe Acrobat?

Thanks in advance for any tips.
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Old 11-13-2009, 07:41 AM   #2
Benwiggy
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What are you printing to? Most laser printers can't print to the very edge of the sheet, requiring a small boundary for "gripping" (or other reason).

If you want to have ink (toner) going to the edge, then you need to print your page onto a larger sheet size, and trim the page afterwards, with the tab element going beyond the page boundary, and extending into the larger sheet by 3mm or more. ("bleed")
If you include trim marks, you can see where you need to cut the page.

You would do this in FrameMaker, not in Distiller or Acrobat.

I've not used FM, but in the print or PDF export menu, there should be settings to select sheet size (different from page size); specify bleed distance; and add crop or trim marks.
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Old 11-13-2009, 08:07 AM   #3
melaroonie
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Once I have the PDF ready to go, I send it to our production dept, so I'm afraid I can't give you the exact type of printer. I posed the same question to them earlier in the week and was told that they have a "brand new print press printer that is a workhorse and does a lot more than the other printers". They told me that if I set my PDF save options to the custom page size, then they should have no problem. Hmmm...

Thank you for the trim info - I know that the pages were trimmed in the past to bring the tab to the edge and was hoping that there was another way <smile>. There are both print and pdf setup options available in FM - I'll try customizing that way and check the results. When I looked earlier, I couldn't locate the option to add crop and trim marks, but I may have overlooked something.
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