(December 6, 2004) Rochester Institute of Technology, consistently named by U.S. World News & Report as one of the top universities in the U.S., earned its reputation as the leader in printing and graphic media education through its long history of providing its 15,300 students with access to the best technology available. It was this commitment to integrating the latest in digital asset management and workflow technology that helped drive the RIT’s School of Print Media faculty to make Xinet’s FullPress and WebNative a mainstay in its upper-level Digital Asset Management classes as well as their mandatory freshman Workflow I & II courses. "Digital Asset Management and its link to publishing in all forms--print and electronic--is now an essential part of printing curricula. RIT students will continue to be ahead of the curve with access to Xinet capabilities for course and research work," said Frank Romano, RIT Professor Emeritus. The Digital Asset Management class for juniors and seniors in the Graphic Media and New Media curricula at RIT’s School of Print Media is built around Xinet’s WebNative solution to help teach students the technical and business aspects of Digital Asset Management. "Students love to work with WebNative, especially once they realize all the capabilities that are under the hood, " said Assistant Professor Dr. Franziska Frey, who teaches the course. "Looking at case studies of companies using Xinet and other software products helps to deepen their understanding of DAM." During the 10-week course, students get an overview of DAM systems on the market today and learn about technical metadata, creating assets that can be repurposed, XML/XMP, the human factors of Digital Asset Management, how to know if your company needs a Digital Asset Management system, cost savings of a Digital Asset Management system, and Digital Asset Management implementation. Students then apply the concepts they’ve learned by using WebNative to work on catalogues, newsletters and brochures. "They get to see firsthand how a product like Xinet supports every aspect of DAM, from searching and version control, to archiving and cross media publishing," Frey said. RIT Graphic Media freshmen begin their studies with a required two-course sequence in workflow. With the goal of producing print-ready files for a wide array of applications and under a variety of circumstances, the Workflow I and II courses focus on establishing a good understanding of the production process and its many variables. "By the end of the Workflow series, they will have learned how to make good physical output, work faster and work collaboratively," said Assistant Professor Michael Riordan, who teaches the Workflow series. Once they have established a foundation of good production understanding, RIT teaches students advanced workflow models by introducing them to FullPress and WebNative, and having them use the Xinet solution to build a sophisticated production system themselves. "Xinet has all the tools and functionality that we need. Whether it’s publishing, packaging, or some other area, we can cover all production that students need to be aware of," Riordan said. "The main objective of the Workflow courses is to show students how to build production workflows systems that work. FullPress and WebNative allow them to do that in an innovative and collaborative environment." The award-winning FullPress is an advanced suite of production workflow applications that has led the industry since its introduction in 1995. FullPress constitutes the workflow backbone for thousands of printing, publishing and advertising customers worldwide. WebNative allows immediate, secure 24/7 access to files, print hot folders and archives on the server via any Web browser. WebNative acts as a window into the file and archive system. WebNative Venture combines the functionality of WebNative with an integrated, enterprise-strength SQL database. So far, reaction on campus has been very positive. "The overwhelming response from students is ‘Wow.’ Xinet software definitely has a ‘Wow’ factor, particularly when they see WebNative in action," said Erich Lehman, Prepress Facilities Manager at RIT, and a teaching assistant to multiple classes. Lehman said he and the students are particularly impressed with how WebNative integrates with Picture Wrangler, Xinet’s automatic image re-linking and updating tool. "What struck the students is they can use the standard layout applications that they already know and use Picture Wrangler’s drag and drop tools in the layout applications on the assets via WebNative. And it’s linked back to the server so you don’t have to worry about updating changes," Lehman said. "It’s dummy-proof, it’s easy, and it works." Included with the FullPress package, Picture Wrangler works with Quark’s QuarkXPress, Adobe InDesign CS and Adobe Illustrator, to make working with complicated layouts faster and more efficient. The newest version of Picture Wrangler includes transparency support so when an image is to be flattened, it automatically links to a high-resolution version of the image. "The seamless integration between FullPress, WebNative and the Picture Wrangler plug-ins to QuarkXPress, InDesign and Illustrator is the biggest benefit of the Xinet solution," Lehman said. "The beauty of the Xinet solution is that a person spends less time trying to get it to work as opposed to just working." RIT Relies on Xinet to Teach Students Best DAM and Workflow Practices