Quark Inc. today announced the release of Quark Publishing System 3 Classic Edition (QPS Classic 3), the next step in the development of the industry-leading software for professional publishing and editorial workflows. QPS Classic 3 provides full support for QuarkXPress 6 and Mac OS X, along with other performance enhancements. Used by more than 50,000 people at publishing sites worldwide, QPS Classic is one of the leading publishing systems in the industry. Easy-to-use editorial solution QPS Classic is an out-of-the-box solution that provides a cross-platform, collaborative tool with simple, status-based workflow and routing capabilities that can be easily adapted to different publishing environments. Multiple users can work on different elements of a QuarkXPress print or Web layout -- including content and page design elements -- simultaneously and in real-time. With QPS Classic, page creation and production can be distributed to editorial, design, web, and production users. QPS Classic provides interactive alerts to keep all users up to date, dramatically reducing production time. "QPS Classic 3 combines the award-winning workgroup publishing solution with Mac OS X and the new features of QuarkXPress 6. With QPS Classic 3, customers can work with mixed print and Web layouts, synchronized text as well as assign tables as articles and edit them using QuarkCopyDesk," said Jurgen Kurz, senior vice president of product development. "Working closely with Apple, we have put special focus on ensuring a smooth migration to Mac OS X, and have certified QuarkDispatch server on Apple's Xserve G5. Features such as the ability to check in QPS 1 and QPS 2 configuration files to QuarkDispatch 3, and the ability to replicate files from QuarkDispatch 2.2 to QuarkDispatch 3, combined with the flexibility to deploy on Xserve G5s will make the transition for our customers easy and cost effective." "Apple is excited about the release of QPS Classic for Mac OS X and its qualification for the Xserve G5," said Ron Okamoto, Apple's vice president of Worldwide Developer Relations. "With QPS Classic 3, Quark has delivered a simple yet powerful desktop publishing platform that works seamlessly with Xserve G5 and further advances the fast and reliable publishing workflow for Mac OS X customers." As designers or writers work on a project, managers can monitor the status of each piece, avoid bottlenecks, and help meet tight production deadlines. The software provides built-in revision control for various file types, allowing users to see previous versions of QuarkXPress layouts or QuarkCopyDesk articles. QPS Classic provides tight control over file access by defining roles and assigning privileges throughout the workflow. "We've used Quark Publishing System for more than a decade. I think that speaks to the quality of the product and the stability we've experienced using it. We look forward to using QuarkXPress 6 in our QPS workflow," said Eric Jacobs, general manager of The Daily Pennsylvanian. "Now we are able to profit from the new features in QuarkXPress 6 and QPS Classic 3. With multiple undos, projects with multiple layout spaces, and even table support in the workflow, we can reduce creation time and cut costs again. We love this solution because it has helped us run our business for more than 10 years." Built on the latest version of QuarkXPress As the foundation for QPS Classic 3, QuarkXPress 6 allows users to manage projects with mixed print and Web layouts, share colors, share style sheets, and synchronize text. Tables can now be assigned to editors who can enter the appropriate data using QuarkCopyDesk or import data and charts from Microsoft Excel -- without losing the formatting from the source document. QPS Classic 3 supports QuarkXPress layers. Multiple variants of an article can be placed on separate layers to streamline versioned and localized documents. To facilitate comment handling and archiving, users can now print all the notes from a layout as a single document. Notes now feature custom background colors for easier, on-screen viewing. Other enhancements include full support for TCP/IP, a significantly larger file limit, and tools to assist in migrating files and configurations from previous versions of QPS Classic. QuarkCopyDesk enhancements QuarkCopyDesk is text-editing software that gives editorial users a WYSIWYG view of articles with pictures of page layout elements. This allows writers and editors to see exactly how text is placed on a layout without the ability to change the geometry. QuarkCopyDesk 3 displays the elements of a page picture just as they would be displayed in QuarkXPress -- now with transparent text boxes. Their editorial experience is as rich as that of a designer. An editor can use all of the familiar text formatting tools such as kerning, leading, font size, and type to get a perfect, copy-fitted document -- there is no need to have the full QuarkXPress product installed. To assist in the migration of existing QPS Classic sites to Mac OS X, QuarkCopyDesk 3 is available for Mac OS X, and Mac OS 9.2.2, Windows 2000, and Windows XP. Pricing and availability QPS Classic 3 is available now. Customers with current Quark maintenance agreements will receive the upgrade at no charge. Specific pricing for new installations is determined on a per-seat basis. For more information or for a product demonstration, publishers can contact their local Quark representative.