Engine Setup preferences

Background

These preferences allow control over Connect job processing settings.

This page appears in a both the Designer Preferences and the Connect Server Configuration tool preferences, but with some different options between each.

This preference page was added in 2018.2 to improve ease of control over output production settings.

For further background on Engine Configuration, see this page: Engine configuration.

Settings

  • Maximum Data Converters selection. This setting only appears in the PlanetPress Connect Server Configuration tool Preferences, but not in the Designer Preferences.
    PSand PCL input have to be converted to PDF before data mapping can be performed. For this, a DataMapper engine will request a conversion engine.
    The selection here manages the maximum number of PS/PCL conversion requests that can be handled in parallel.
    When printing from the Designer, the Designer offloads PCL conversions to the Server but locally handles PS conversions.
  • Tasks handled by:
    Select how Connect jobs are to be processed. The choices are between:
    • Engines (separate processes): Select to have a number of separate engines (for Data Mapping, Merging and Weaver, as appropriate) to process jobs.
      This is the best choice for production environments.
    • Connect Server (not scalable): Select to have single Connect Sever handle processing.
      This option is not scalable and should only really be used for low memory non-production (test) environments.
  • Number of engines. This group is only available if Engines were selected as the processing architecture.
    • DataMapper Engines selection: This selection is not available in PlanetPress Connect Designer Preferences.
      Select the desired amount of DataMapper Engines.

      Adding DataMapper engines might be useful in the following circumstances:

      When large data mapping operations have to be run simultaneously for many jobs When frequently using PDF or XML based input. Particularly in the case of XML input with large individual records. When the All-In-One plugin is used often in Workflow configurations and there are more than two Merge engines running. The Connect MySQL database needs a fast storage system (SSD or other fast devices) to be able to keep up with two or more DataMapper engines. When the database is installed on a system with a slow hard drive, adding a DataMapper engine may not increase the overall performance.

    • Merge Engines selection: Select the desired amount of Merge Engines.

      Generally, launching a relatively high number of Merge engines results in better performance, as Merge engines are involved in the creation of output of all kinds (Print, Email and Web) and because content creation is relatively time-consuming.

    • Weaver Engines selection: This option is read-only in PlanetPress Connect Designer Preferences.
      Select the desired amount of Weaver (Output) Engines.
      Adding extra Weaver (Output) engine(s) might be useful when large Print jobs are to be run simultaneously with smaller Print jobs.

  • Memory. This group is only available if Engines were selected as the processing architecture.
    Memory per engine (mb): Specify the maximum amount of random access memory (RAM) in megabytes that will be used per engine in order to make optimal use of the machine's memory.
    The selections made here will apply to all Engines of that type.
    These setting only control the maximum size of the Java heap memory that an engine can use; the total amount of memory that will used by an engine is actually a bit higher.

    Also keep in mind that the Connect Server and the operating system itself will need memory to keep running.
  • DataMapper Engine (MB) selection: This selection is not available in PlanetPress Connect Designer Preferences.
    Select the desired amount of DataMapper Engine memory.
    DataMapper engines may perform better with greater memory when running jobs containing a lot of data.
  • Merge Engines (MB) selection: Select the desired amount of Merge Engine memory.
    For complex templates with a lot of pages per document, there is a chance that Merge engines will run better with more memory.
  • Weaver Engine (MB) selection:
    Select the desired amount of Weaver (Output) Engine memory.
    When running really large jobs, it often pays to increase Weaver memory allocation, even if only for the duration of the production job(s).
    The maximum memory usage of a Weaver engine can be relevant for jobs with heavy graphics; or for jobs that use Cut & Stack impositioning; or for jobs using particular variables that entail page buffering (see Content variables).