Silicon Connector for MediaValet User Guide

These instructions are valid for MediaValet CC Connector. If you don’t have the latest version, you can download the latest from https://medialibrary.mediavalet.com/portals/AdobeConnector

Installation & Licensing Instructions

To install MediaValet CC Connector, close Adobe InDesign and other CC applications.
Double-click the installer and follow the prompts.
After installation completes successfully, launch Adobe InDesign to see the following dialog:

If you have a license key for MediaValet CC Connector, click Yes to activate, or click No to activate later.

If you activate your license later, choose Activate… from InDesign’s Connector menu.

To deactivate the current license, choose Deactivate from the same location. This will allow you to activate MediaValet CC Connector on another computer.

Opening MediaValet CC Connector

From the main InDesign menu, choose Window > Extensions > MediaValet Connector

You will be presented with a login dialog. Enter your credentials, and click Next to login to the MediaValet CC Connector. You will be sent to the MediaValet site to log in. To logout from your session, choose Logout from the MediaValet CC Connector flyout menu. To login again, you’ll find the menu item now shows Login. Choosing that will bring up the login dialog again.

Using MediaValet CC Connector

Once logged into the MediaValet CC Connector, you will be presented with your Home location. You can navigate to your assets via saved Categories and Lightboxes, or perform a search by clicking one of the options below.

If you wish to find an asset via Search, you will have a number of filtering options to limit your search results.

Once you’ve found an image, select it and drag it to your InDesign document. Release your mouse button, and your cursor will load with a thumbnail of the image. Just click and drag to place it on your document at the size you want.

If you are working with Word files, or are a power user who needs InDesign’s “Show Import Options” for PDF or other image types, use this preference for more flexibility and options with drag and drop.

Supported file types

The following file type extensions are able to be placed and linked from Connector.

ai, bmp, ct, doc, docx, emf, eps, gif, icml, idms, incx, indd, indt, inma, jpeg, jpg, pcc, pcx, pdf, png, psd, rle, rtf, sct, text, tif, tiff, txt, xlsx

Using the MediaValet Flyout Menu

You have a number of options available from the MediaValet CC Connector flyout menu. Here the user can Log in or Log out, Upload assets from your browser, or Upload Selected assets in your InDesign document. If you are using local images that are not already on the DAM, you can upload those images by choosing Upload All Non-HTTP Assets. Image, assets, and indd documents can also use the Check Out commands, ensuring your changes are not overwritten. Relink to Current Folder links local assets in your InDesign document to assets on the MediaValet DAM if those assets are available there. Use the Filter option if you wish to change your filtering options.

About provides information about MediaValet CC Connector.
Log Out / Log In opens the authentication window.
Refresh refreshes the contents of your current folder.
Upload from Disk opens your System Browser to choose an asset to your MediaValet account.
Upload Selected uploads a selected asset in your InDesign document to your MediaValet account.
Upload InDesign Document uploads your current InDesign document to your MediaValet account.
Upload All Non-HTTP Assets uploads all local assets in your InDesign document to your MediaValet account.
Relink to Current Folder relinks local assets to assets of the same name in the MediaValet Connector panel.
Check Out checks out a saved asset or InDesign document
Cancel Check Out cancels current assets or InDesign documents that have already been checked out.
Preferences opens the Preferences window.
Filter opens the Filter panel to change your filtering options
About Silicon Publishing provides information on Silicon Publishing

Preferences and Links Panels

MediaValet CC Connector has a number of customizable preferences to enhance your workflow.

Place options:

Replace selection on place (Enabled):
Replaces the selected object with the asset you dragged from the Connector panel.
Replace selection on place (Disabled):
Places your asset from Connector as a new object on the page.

Download Options

Open if Possible (Enabled):
Will open InDesign documents if possible, and save to the Documents/mediavalet_connector_files folder.
Open if Possible (Disabled):
Documents will not open on download, asking instead where to save the file.

Check Out (Detail View Only):
Takes place automatically if the user chooses to enable for Detail View.
Check Out on Edit Original:
Takes place automatically when using Edit Original when this option is enabled.

Upload Options

Create New Version on Upload: Will create a new version of the file if the same file, with same name already exists on the DAM.
Export and Upload PDF: Will export a PDF file with selected PDF options when uploading an indd document.

Asset View

Use Grid view: Displays assets in a thumbnail gallery, with truncated file names when necessary.
Use List view: Lists assets with smaller thumbnails and extended file names.

Asset Labels

Name: Displays assets by their file names.
Title: Displays assets by their title names.

Troubleshooting

Write to log file: When checked, creates a log file in your Documents/mediavalet_connector_files folder.
Clear log file: Click this to clear the log file.

Detail View

Double-clicking an asset in the Connector panel will open the asset in Detail View. You will see an enlarged thumbnail of your image, along with the corresponding metadata. To download a copy of an asset, double-click the asset you want to download. Then click the download arrow to begin the download process to your Documents/mediavalet_connector_files folder.

Edit Original

When working in InDesign, users sometimes want to open up a placed image or Illustrator file for editing. Users can do this by using the native Edit Original option from the InDesign Links panel. Users can work in Photoshop or Illustrator and use the Save command to update the local file, and see their changes in InDesign. When complete, choose Finish Edit Original from the MediaValet CC Connector panel in Photoshop or Illustrator to save, close, upload the file to MediaValet and restore the URL link in InDesign.

Working with Connector in Photoshop and Illustrator

After installing MediaValet CC Connector, you’ll find the same extension in Photoshop and Illustrator. If you wish to edit an existing file on your MediaValet account, Drag and Drop your asset like you would in InDesign. A copy of the file will be saved locally to the mediavalet_connector_files folder in your Documents folder, and then opened in your Adobe app. Currently, you cannot drag and drop from the extension panel to place an asset as a new layer. Make your edits in Photoshop or Illustrator and save. If you want to upload a new version from MediaValet CC Connector, save the file with a new name, and choose Upload from the flyout menu. Then just navigate to where you saved the file, and click Okay. You can upload any supported file types to MediaValet this way.

Network Considerations

Since MediaValet CC Connector requires network access to MediaValet and the Silicon Publishing licensing server, there are certain network requirements to consider. You may find that working from home, where there is no proxy or firewall, you can use MediaValet CC Connector without a problem, but at work, you run into errors when trying to activate or use it.

Proxy

You can configure your proxy settings in the SC.properties file located in

/Users/username/Library/Preferences/SiliconConnector/ (Mac)

C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\SiliconConnector\ (Win)

This file can be edited with a basic text editor and is documented with definitions of each property. Properties should be formatted with key=value syntax, e.g. sc.http.proxy_server=proxyserver.com

Firewall

If your company has a firewall, you will need to be sure to whitelist the Silicon Publishing licensing server. The URL to whitelist is https://licensing.siliconpublishing.com.

Uninstalling MediaValet CC Connector

MediaValet CC Connector has two parts: an extension to provide the panel and the plug-in to provide the underlying linking technology.

Mac

If you do not plan on installing MediaValet CC Connector in the future, deactivate MediaValet CC Connector by choosing the menu item Connector > Deactivate from the main InDesign menu.

Remove the extension folder:

/Library/Application Support/Adobe/CEP/extensions/MediaValetCCConnector

Remove the plug-in folder:

/Applications/Adobe InDesign 2020/Plug-Ins/SiliconConnectorMediaValet

Remove the mediavalet_connector_files folder:

/Users/username/Documents/mediavalet_connector_files

If you do not plan on installing MediaValet CC Connector again, you can also remove the preferences located at:

/Users/username/Library/Preferences/SiliconConnector/

Windows