IFRAtrack 2.0 and its Future Extensions - the Glue for Integration in Business-wide Workflow Management Systems.

Production processes in the graphic arts industry are becoming more complex, time-critical and physically integrated. In a digital world this put new demands on management and creates new possibilities of intersystem integration. The necessary IT infrastructure is available today, but the mechanisms for interchange of management information are not standardized. This paper presents the IFRAtrack recommendation, a tracking information interchange mechanism for integrating production management systems in the graphic arts industry. IFRAtrack was developed jointly by representatives of newspapers, system manufacturers and research organizations. The current version, IFRAtrack 2.0 is presented and future extensions are discussed. In prototype applications, IFRAtrack has proven to be an excellent vehicle for integrating heterogeneous multivendor systems in the newspaper and the catalogue industry. Our aim is to show that further extensions can be included to handle the wide range of businesses and systems that the industry contains. Industry restructuring will require the management of networked virtual enterprise production processes. Increased information repurposing will require the management of parallel production of printed and digital products. IFRAtrack is a powerful mechanism that through simple extensions can handle very complex processes.