Layout Foundry Gang Sheets

Description

Layout Foundry Gang Sheets adds a gang sheet builder to the WooCommerce products you choose. It is for shops that print DTF transfers, UV DTF or stickers and charge by the length of film.

The shopper adds PNG or JPG designs, sets the width and number of copies for each one, and checks the layout. The builder packs the designs across your film width in an efficient layout, shows the length, the film left without ink and every position as text beside the preview, and makes a print-ready file. When the shopper approves the sheet, the file is saved on your own server and the basket quantity is set from the sheet length.

What the plugin does

• Builds the sheet in the shopper’s browser. Designs are read, packed and turned into a print file on the shopper’s device.
• Saves the approved print file and a small preview in wp-content/uploads/layout-foundry/ on your server, with random file names. The folder cannot be listed.
• Works out the quantity on your server from the length of the print file, the minimum length and your pricing unit. Shoppers cannot change it in the basket.
• Shows the sheet length in the basket, checkout, order emails and the customer’s account.
• Shows the preview and the download links on the order screen, to shop managers only.
• Deletes every print file 14 days after it was saved, with a daily WP-Cron task.
• Warns about low-resolution designs, designs with no transparency and designs wider than the film. Warnings never stop an order.
• Sticker sheets: give a product a cut line margin and each design gets a cut line that far outside its outline. A PDF holds the cut lines in the CutContour spot colour. With PNG print files, an SVG file of the cut lines is saved beside the print file and listed on the order screen.
• Finished sheet uploads: let shoppers upload a gang sheet they made themselves, beside the builder or instead of it. The sheet is one PNG with its DPI saved; the plugin reads its length from the file and prices it per pricing unit, as a built sheet of that length.

Settings

WooCommerce > Gang sheets:

• Units: centimetres or inches.
• Film width, spacing between designs and edge margin.
• Minimum length and pricing unit (for example, a price per 10 cm).
• File types shoppers can add: PNG, JPG or both.
• Low resolution warning in DPI.
• Print file: PNG at 300 DPI, split into panels on very long sheets, or PDF.
• Storage limit, so saved files cannot fill your server disk.

Turn the builder on for a simple product under Product data > General > Gang sheet builder. Set the product price to the price of one pricing unit. For stickers, set Cut line margin (mm) on the same tab, from 0 to 5 mm. Leave it blank for gang sheets without cut lines.

Privacy

• The plugin makes no requests to Layout Foundry or any other outside service. It sets no cookies and adds no tracking.
• Designs stay on the shopper’s device until they approve the sheet. Only the finished print file and its preview are sent, and only to your own site.
• A shopper can save an unfinished sheet as a draft. The draft stays in their browser on that device and never reaches your site. They can delete it from the builder, and it is deleted automatically after 30 days.
• The daily task deletes the files after 14 days. Deleting the plugin removes its settings and every saved file.

The plugin adds suggested text to Settings > Privacy that you can copy into your privacy policy.

Free

Every feature on this page is free and has no usage limit.

Source code

The builder is written in TypeScript. The files in assets/embed/ are built from the TypeScript in the source/ folder of this plugin with esbuild. The build steps are in source/BUILD.md.

The PDF print file uses pdf-lib 1.17.1 (MIT licence), source at https://github.com/Hopding/pdf-lib.