How iPlus works
Stage 1: Select a publication or report
Identify a suitable publication or report to automate with iPlus. This is likely to be a data driven publication containing data from a variety of sources which needs to be produced on a monthly/weekly/daily basis. Currently you may have a number of staff performing repetitive steps, pulling data together manually.
Stage 2: Break it down
Define how your publication can be broken down into separate items - for example each table, chart, image or piece of text. Next, define which Workflow path, or business process, each of these items will take - iPlus Workflows can specify that the data for the item changes weekly or monthly etc, but also who within your company is responsible for each stage of the Workflow. For example one person may have the task of writing a commentary while another may be authorised to approve it. Special 'Creation Rules' can be set up to automatically import data against the correct Workflow.
Stage 3: Styling
Define the style guides you will use in your publication - the globally defined colours, paragraph formats and chart and table styles. iPlus allows very exact control over your typography and layout and a great range of fully customisable table and charts styles. Defining the styles globally ensures brand consistency.
Stage 4: Layout
Next, take your individual items and put them together onto the page - along with the appropriate style. The same layouts can then be used with different underlying data - in a financial publication this might be data for different funds or sets of funds. iPlus includes intelligent functionality to deal with complex setups and items that may differ in certain situations.
Stage 5: Publish
Select the output formats you wish to generate... and press publish. iPlus will draw together the most up-to-date data, style it and generate your PDF, HTML, Spreadsheet or Powerpoint presentation.
...And the following week or month:
Simply press publish again to generate a new version of your publication with the most up-to-date data.
To see iPlus in action, click here to watch a demonstration movie.
