Production lines

A job is the container for one piece of production work: its customer, files, instructions, assignments, stage, and history. Production lines describe what the team will make or prepare inside that job. Converting an order creates one or more jobs when the team accepts the requested work for production. Each new job can receive suggested production lines from the conversion, or a manager can add and correct them on the job during Intake and Prepress. The source order remains available as a converted record.

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Decide what belongs on one line

Use one line for plates with the same production specifications. Quantity counts the required separations, each of which has its own LEN identity. For example, four 200 × 300 mm plates with the same material, thickness, technology, PixelBoost code, and buffer can remain on one line. Split lines when their kind, dimensions, material, process specifications, buffer, mounting materials, or design level differ. You do not need separate lines merely because plates will use different gangs, orientations, equipment, or completion times: CDI tracks each plate individually after release.

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Add each kind with the right fields

Open an active job in Intake or Prepress, find Production lines, and use the empty row at the bottom. Choose the kind, enter its fields, and select Add. For a line added directly on the job, the physical dimension unit appears beside Width and Height and follows the organization’s configured dimension unit. Positive dimensions and the required material fields must be present before Add is enabled. A converted line can retain a dimension unit explicitly supplied by the order.

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Complete dimensions brought in from an order

An order can be converted when a printing plate or mounting carrier size is not yet known. The resulting job shows No plate dimensions for that line. This is a deliberate unknown value, not a zero-size plate. During Intake or Prepress, use Edit to enter Width and Height. For LEN files, use Review LEN data to check the extracted dimensions and process settings and create or update the appropriate production line. Missing details appear as warnings in the Prepress handoff. They do not block a submission for manager review, but the team should resolve them before approval: a plate without dimensions, a LEN identity, or the required process specifications cannot be arranged in CDI.

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Understand Plate buffer

Buffer is extra material on every side of the artwork. It increases the physical footprint and billed area of the printing plate. The original Width and Height continue to describe the artwork. For 200 × 300 mm artwork with a 10 mm Buffer: billed size = (200 + 2 × 10) × (300 + 2 × 10) = 220 × 320 mm The billed area is then multiplied by Quantity. The buffer applies only to Printing plate lines, not Mounting carrier or Design lines. After a line is saved, select Edit to set a line-specific Buffer. Leave it inherited to use the selected Billing company setting. When there is no separate billing company, Flexoworks uses the customer company setting, then falls back to the organization setting. The saved line shows the effective value and its source—line override, company settings, or organization settings—as well as the billed size and area.

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Edit, duplicate, or remove a line

Every saved line has three early-stage actions:

• Edit corrects that line in place.
• Duplicate starts a copy, which is useful when most fields are the same but one meaningful detail differs.
• Remove deletes the line from the job.

Creating, editing, or removing a line recalculates the generated rows in Billing preview. Editing production data while a manager review is pending also reopens the review because its saved production snapshot is no longer current. Production lines can be changed only in Intake and Prepress. Manager approval moves the job to Imaging and locks the line specification. Review quantities, dimensions, materials, levels, and splits before selecting Approve and send to Imaging. See Prepress review and manager handoff for the complete approval flow.

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Track each plate through CDI and the terminal

Manager approval creates one tracked plate per required unit. In the job’s Individual plates card, inspect each separation’s current status, gang, orientation, and replacement history. The CDI operator arranges these plates on physical inventory sheets and records the Esko queue handoff. The terminal team finishes imaging and washout for each gang. The job moves to Washout when all current required plates have been imaged, and to QC when all have been washed. It can remain in Imaging while one gang has already moved further. A replacement returns only the failed separation to the ready queue; successful siblings and billed quantity stay unchanged. Mounting carrier and Design lines are outside this plate-gang workflow.

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Keep production lines and billing lines distinct

The job deliberately shows two separate sections: A printing plate line normally generates a material-area row. A Mounting carrier can generate one row for Base film and another for Cushion mount. A Design line generates a row from its Design level. Configured service rates can add further rows. “Frozen” means the billing rows are stored rather than being an invisible live formula. Line changes during Intake or Prepress regenerate the relevant rows; Recalculate refreshes them from the current pricing configuration. If the work specification is correct but the commercial amount needs an exception, use a billing-row override instead of falsifying the production line.

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Check the lines before handoff

Before marking Prepress ready for review, confirm that:

• Quantity groups only identical work;
• each required plate has the correct LEN separation identity;
• every physical line has the correct Width, Height, and materials;
• every Design line has the correct Design level;
• each Plate uses the intended effective Buffer;
• Billing preview reflects the work the customer should be charged for.

Then continue through Prepress review and the normal job stages and transitions.