Getting started
Filename conventions
The name a file arrives with sets its size. The name it leaves with states the page. Both are centimetres, and the difference between them is the clearance.
2 min read
Filenames here are not labels, they are data. The whole shop reads the size off them, which is why nothing will silently rename a file to make something fit.
Sizes in, and how they are read
Height is the default. Width has to say so: the word width, the word wide, or a b suffix. When a name carries both, height wins.
| Filename | Read as |
|---|---|
| LEAF_30CM | height 30 |
| FERN_40h / FERN_40H | height 40 |
| flutie125h | height 125 |
| IM_50h_ | height 50 |
| SIGN_240_width | width 240 |
| Merre_Blueprint_102h_102b | height 102 — height wins when both are present |
No recognised token and nothing is guessed: on the web the size field is simply left for you to type, and in a command-line folder run the file is skipped and reported.
Every size token is centimetres. 50h is a 50 cm sticker, not 50 mm. A finished size wrong by a factor of ten is always this.
Sizes out
Output is always NAME_Hh_Wb.pdf. h is height, b is breadth, both in centimetres, both whole numbers — and both are the PAGE, not the artwork.
LEAF_30CM.png is 30 cm of artwork. It measures 18.6 × 30 cm once the silhouette is found, so the page is 21 × 32 cm and the file saves as LEAF_32h_21b.pdf. Height first in the name, and the page is always the artwork plus the clearance.
The width rounds up to a whole centimetre so the number stays an integer, which only ever widens the margin. Artwork 70.6 × 50 cm gives a 73 × 52 cm page: 2.0 cm of clearance vertically and 2.4 cm horizontally.
What does and does not change the name
- A weeding box does not. The box is clamped to whatever the existing clearance can hold rather than growing the page, precisely because a page that grew would have to be renamed.
- A mirror does not. Flipping left to right does not change the size of anything, so the name still describes the page. The mirrored file is written into a different folder for that reason.
- A resize does. The artwork scales, the page is re-derived from artwork plus clearance with the width rounded up again, and the name is re-derived from the new page — landing on exactly the name a fresh trace at that size would have given it.
- A panelled job adds a tag. Each panel is NAME_TAG_Hh_Wb.pdf, so a pile of pages says which is which before the assembly map is opened.
Naming files you send out
The lowercase h and b is the convention across everything here, drawn shapes included — the uppercase form some older house files used was deliberately not kept. A shop emitting two conventions eventually cuts to the wrong one.
Try it on your own artwork
Upload a file and read the preflight before you quote.