• TechNotes
• Notes on OLE functionality in PlotMaker

PlotMaker's OLE capabilities are currently unavailable on Mac OS X, pending the release of Microsoft's software developer kit for Mac OS X. This, too, will be remedied as soon as we receive the required tools from Microsoft.

Note: OLE is available on Mac OS X between MS applications, but for 3rd party OLE developers only a limited set of functions was made available. These functions are however insufficient for implementing PlotMaker's OLE functionality on Mac OS X.

OLE limits from Word:

Objects linked via OLE that originate from Word are by default cropped (in fact the text is wrapped) to fit to a 6" x 9" page by Word (with all margins set to 0 inch). This is the maximum area that can be linked as an object from Word.

As a workaround for copying more than one page with OLE we suggest reducing the font size in Word to the minimum, then resizing your drawing in PlotMaker as desired.

OLE limits from Excel:

Originally, only the area seen on screen could be OLEd into PlotMaker in one step. The more seen on the display, the more that could be pasted - (i.e. the higher the resolution of the screen the more could be copied and pasted via OLE into 3rd party applications) Since PlotMaker 2.3 R3/v3 large sheets are pasted to PlotMaker by a custom solution to overcome this OLE limit imposed by Microsoft (the limit is still there from Word because no workaround could be found for it).

Other known problems with OLE and PlotMaker:

1. Copy from Excel to PlotMaker: only some columns/rows are pasted
   This can be because the Print Area is defined in Excel; in this case our workaround for pasting huge sheets does not work.
   Solutions:

   • EITHER turn off the Print Area,
   • OR Select one column or row more than the Print Area (which is probably what you want to copy to PM) and copy-paste that to the layout.

2. Colors get shifted when plotting OLE documents on Mac and Windows (on the screen and at printing from Windows it's OK):
   When plotting on both platforms, or printing from a Macintosh, the OLE link has to be broken to generate the data for the plotter/printer (Mac only) to process. (While printing and appearance on screen is entirely controlled by the OLE server (PlotMaker has no control over that), when the OLE link is broken, the data is transformed into WMF by the OLE Server. The result is then sent to the plotter.) So shifting of colors can happen because PlotMaker searches AMONG THE EXISTING Pens and Colors for the colors in the WMF document (previously OLEd document). If the shift results in unacceptable plots, you should add a pen with such an RGB color as the color that gets shifted to the pen table in PlotMaker prior to plotting.
   When printing on Windows, the application (PlotMaker) has no control of what gets printed: printing is handled entirely by the OLE server.

3. I get Gridlines of Excel sheets printed/plotted - how can I turn them off?
   Turn them off in Excel.

4. Macintosh only: PlotMaker: When printing OLE objects originating from Excel, they can shrink if MS Office 2001 Service release 1 is installed.
   This is a bug in OLE, reported to MS. Try using Copy-Paste a linked drawing object instead of Add Drawing.

5. OLE in PlotMaker: text rotated in Excel is shown on screen but will not be plotted.
   We experienced this with Office 98 on Macintosh. Rotated text is badly exported by MS into OLE - it'll be missing when plotted or printed (see note 2.), however it can be seen on the screen. According to our testing this was fixed with the release of MS Office 2001 SR1 for Macintosh.

6. Macintosh only: OLE: Justified text setting gets lost when plotting.
   If the paragraph's alignment in Word was 'Justified,' it may be plotted aligned to the left.

7. WordArt pictures with gradient colors are generally problematic with OLE and PlotMaker

8. Splines from Excel are lost, when the OLE link is broken
   (Windows: plotting, Macintosh: printing or plotting) Splines can be seen in flowcharts in Excel documents.

CategoryLayouting, CategoryInputOutput