Blog | WoodWing

The Swivle Agent: seamless editing from your browser in your favorite application

Written by Magdalena Ivanova | Dec 10, 2021 1:53:00 PM

Our mission is to make WoodWing Swivle the central hub for all your content and to build a tool you love to use on a daily basis. To fulfill this mission, we focus not only on making sure you can easily store, search and find all your content, but also on ways to support your daily creative processes. One of the most common daily tasks is to quickly edit a file that is already stored in WoodWing Swivle. Obviously, you want to use your favorite desktop applications to make these changes; those are the apps you have mastered and have learned to love.

In WoodWing Swivle, we support this flow with a 'Check-out' and a 'Check-in'.

The concept of Check-out and Check-in

Sometimes a file that is stored in WoodWing Swivle needs to be changed, and of course, you want to update the same file in Swivle again when you are done with your changes.

For example:

  • An image may need to be edited by cropping it or by changing the image itself
  • Text may need to be added or removed from a Word document
  • You want to update some figures in an Excel document

When you 'Check-out' a file in WoodWing Swivle, it is downloaded locally so you can edit it in your local application. After you have made your desired changes, you can use a 'Check-in' to upload the changed version to Swivle. When you do this, it does not delete the original file, but instead it creates a new version of the asset. This allows you to always have a complete overview of all your file versions, and you can revert to an older version when needed.

Tip: if you are still manually deleting the old file and uploading the new file when you want to update a file, we highly recommend to start making use of the Check-out process to get the full benefits of version management and to prevent file conflicts.

While you are editing a file, it is important that other users cannot make any changes to the same file. You don't want to overwrite someone else's work, but likewise you don't want anyone else to overwrite your work. To prevent this from happening, we lock the file for editing by other users when you Check-out a file. Want to know more about the concept of Check-out and Check-in? Then go to our Help Center for more information.

Seamless editing with the new Swivle Agent

With the new Swivle Agent, the process of Check-out and Check-in just got a whole lot better. Swivle now seamlessly integrates with all your favorite desktop applications. You can open your files straight from WoodWing Swivle in your local apps with one click, make your desired changes, and upload the new version to Swivle with just one click.

We have created a 2-minute video for you that shows how seamless the editing of files becomes with the new Swivle Agent.

 

What does the Swivle Agent do?

You don’t have to manually save your files locally to your desktop anymore to be able to edit them. We’ve removed these manual steps needed to explicitly download and upload digital assets back into your DAM solution: the Swivle Agent automatically opens files in your default application. For example, a .psd file will directly open in Photoshop and a .xlsx file will open in Microsoft Excel or Numbers. Changes and edits to those files will automatically be recognized by Swivle when you hit "Save" in your desktop application. Afterwards, you can Check-in the new version with one click.

Who would use the Swivle Agent?

Anyone, really. Creatives like designers, picture editors and retouch artists might use it for work in Illustrator, InDesign and Photoshop, whereas business development, sales and marketing teams might use it for work in any of the Microsoft Office programs – Word, Excel, PowerPoint.

Which desktop applications are supported?

The Swivle Agent works with any file and any desktop application!

Tip: if you want to edit an InDesign file, we recommend using the InDesign plugin, which enhances your workflow even further.

How does it really work?

It’s a simple 4-step process that takes the user’s natural behavior when editing files into consideration. Here’s how:

  • Click on the file you want to edit
  • Click on ‘Check-out’ (the file will automatically open in its native application)
  • Make your image or text edits and Save the file
  • Click on ‘Check-in’ (the file will automatically be uploaded to WoodWing Swivle as a new version).

How do I install the Swivle Agent?

How to get started with WoodWing Swivle?

If you don't have an active Swivle subscription, you can easily start a 14-day free trial to try out WoodWing Swivle and the new Swivle Agent. If you have any questions, or if you want to get a personalized demo of the Swivle Agent, please reach out to team@swivle.com or schedule a call.