Vista and font cache

[rebecca officer]

Hi Dov

Are you saying that deleting the font cache and rebooting should get
rid of the symptoms for a while, regardless of the size of the font
cache after reboot?

My memory of last year's posts was that you had to also reduce the size
of the font cache by deleting big unused fonts. I did that a few months
ago and my font cache is now around 770 KB. But a document showed the
symptoms again a couple of days ago. Is that what you'd expect?

Next time I have a document with symptoms, I'll try just deleting the
cache and rebooting.

Also, does your email mean that Adobe are hunting for those "old
Windows GDI calls made by FrameMaker" to fix the bug?

Thanks, Rebecca

>>> "Dov Isaacs"  14/02/07 10:42 >>>
The symptom was reported against FrameMaker internally.
The problem has been seen in printing to PostScript 
printers and as such, cannot be traced in any way to
Distiller (or the AdobePDF PostScript printer driver
instance). The symptom is not directly reproducible;
all we know is that by deleting the FNTCACHE.DAT file
and rebooting, the problem goes away, at least for a
while. Since FrameMaker does not and cannot directly
access or manipulate the FNTCACHE.DAT file, the likely
cause of the bug are old Windows GDI calls made by
FrameMaker that are still supported by Windows, but
in which some bug associated with font caching crept
in over the years.

- Dov 

> -Original Message-
> From: Art Campbell [mailto:art.campbell at gmail.com] 
> Sent: Tuesday, February 13, 2007 1:09 PM
> To: Dov Isaacs
> Cc: Framers (E-mail); FrameMaker Discussion Forum
> Subject: Re: Vista and font cache
> 
> Dov,
> 
> Did the missing characters and the apparent link to fntcache.dat
> problem ever get entered as a bug either against Frame or Acrobat
> Distiller?
> 
> Cheers,
> Art
> 
> On 2/13/07, Dov Isaacs  wrote:
> > Yup, it's still there!  C:\Windows\System32\FNTCACHE.DAT
> >
> > However, it has never been a "font management scheme" but
> > rather a caching mechanism for the Windows font renderer.
> >
> > Deleting that file and rebooting every so often apparently
> > "solves" the problem of missing runs of characters when
> > printing from FrameMaker.
> >
> > - Dov
> >
> >
> >
> > > -Original Message-
> > > From: Art Campbell
> > > Sent: Tuesday, February 13, 2007 12:24 PM
> > > To: Framers (E-mail); FrameMaker Discussion Forum
> > > Subject: Vista and font cache
> > >
> > > Could one or two of you Vista early adopters do a quick search
for
> > > fntcache.dat, please?
> > > I'd like to know if Vista has inherited the XP font
> > > management scheme
> > > Thanks!
> > >
> > > Cheers,
> > > Art
___


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Font size in Frame cross ref

[rebecca officer]

Hi David

Well, if it works it's probably okay. The only thing that worries me is
that you may have problems maintaining it long-term.

The general advice is to avoid overrides. But I'd better define what
"override" actually means: it's formatting applied to part or all of a
paragraph by some method other than a character tag. For example, you
can apply an override by changing something in the paragraph designer
and clicking the Apply button, or by using the bold toolbar button. This
is a bad idea because it makes it harder to update a format globally.

Changing the formatting by applying a named character tag is fine. But
if the changed formatting applies to all words in every heading at that
level, you'd be better off just updating the paragraph tag (through the
paragraph designer) and removing the character tag / override from all
of them.

Hope this helps!

Cheers, Rebecca

>>> "Shenton, David (DTRN)" 
14/02/07 03:57 >>>

 Hi Rebecca thanks for the advice

All the cross-refs that worked had a character overrides, The ones
that
were giving me the problem had no character over ride.

So I went in and applied the same character format to the cross-refs
that functioned correctly. and it worked, was this correct method.

Dave

-Original Message-
From: rebecca officer [mailto:rebecca.offi...@alliedtelesis.co.nz] 
Sent: Monday, February 12, 2007 4:41 PM
To: framers at lists.frameusers.com; Shenton, David (DTRN)
Subject: Re: Font size in Frame cross ref

Hi David

Check that someone hasn't applied a character tag to the offending
headers. Even if they look the same as the others, it's possible
someone
applied a character tag and then overrode that character tag to make
the
headings look right. If they have, FM could be displaying the xref
including the character tag.

Cheers, Rebecca


>>> "Shenton, David (DTRN)" 
13/02/07 03:04 >>>

Hi all.Windows XP Unstructured FrameMaker 7.1 

Has anybody experienced this. I have document with multiple cross
references to various headings in a multi chapter document. For some
reason a few of my cross references linked to headers have a larger
font
size than the rest, yet others with the same heading link are correct.
I
have tried relinking, but when I regenerate these delinquent cross
reference appear.

Why is this happening to me?

Regards

Dave

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If you have received this message in error please
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Framemaker vs InDesign

[Ann Zdunczyk]

I use both. Even though InDesign is adding features with CS2 I would not
attempt to create long technical documents with it. As Dov mentioned
"need support for variables (including numbering), structure (XML),
equations (other than via expensive third-party plug-ins), etc."

InDesign is still not up to par with FrameMaker. Even if you go back to
FrameMaker 3 (Unix) where I started, InDesign does not have the
capability of that FrameMaker.

HTH
Z


*
Ann Zdunczyk
President
a2z Publishing, Inc.
http://www.a2z-pub.com
azdunczyk at triad.rr.com
Phone: 336-922-1271
Cell: 336-456-4493
*


-Original Message-
From: framers-bounces+azdunczyk=triad.rr@lists.frameusers.com
[mailto:framers-bounces+azdunczyk=triad.rr.com at lists.frameusers.com] On
Behalf Of Linda Rose
Sent: Tuesday, February 13, 2007 6:53 PM
To: framers at lists.frameusers.com
Subject: Framemaker vs InDesign


Is InDesign a suitable replacement for Framemaker for creating long, 
technical documentation? ___


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Framemaker vs InDesign

[Yves Barbion]

I agree with Dov and Ann too.

And you can add this to the list:

   - XML with DITA
   - Tables and table formats (especially with the great, inexpensive
   TableCleaner plug-in)
   - Cross-references
   - Conditional text
   - Cross-channel publishing with WebWorks Publisher (and maybe other
   Help authoring tools)


-- 
Yves Barbion
Documentation Architect
Adobe-Certified FrameMaker Instructor

OT: Formatting Readmes with Groff/Latex

[Steve Rickaby]

At 15:16 -0500 13/2/07, Neil Tubb wrote:

>I've been told I have to produce Readmes for several of our products in
>text files. I want to be able to control some basic look-and-feel
>though, such as column-width, and it was suggested to me to use Groff or
>Latex. I've been looking into this for a bit, but can't really figure it
>out. Before I spend any more time on this, does anyone have a better
>solution?

Avoid LaTeX like the plague. It has a learning curve in excess of FrameMaker's. 
Follows Art's advice.

TeX/LaTeX is a dinosaur wallowing in the tar-pit of 8-bit systems and smells of 
musty storerooms where card-punch machines have gone to die. It is horrendously 
arcane and completely rooted in the past.

Just my opinion, of course ;-)

-- 
Steve

Reasons to Structure

[r...@weststreetconsulting.com]

Jeremy Griffith, write:



You can do the same with paragraph formats, too.  But you can
do all that in UNstructured docs just as easily as in structured.
Maybe *more* easily, when you factor in the time to set up your
structure, and to modify it when you make changes, which is major.  

I've only been able to identify one situation in which structured 
Frame can do this better than unstructured, and that's when you'd 
want nested element tags within a paragraph, since you cam't nest 
character formats.  (There are easy workarounds for creating the 
equivalent of nested paragraph formats, such as using start/end 
formats and/or markers.)  OTOH, I have yet to see a non-hypothetical 
case where such nested char formats were really needed...

Structured Frame is designed for large pubs groups where standard
document designs are required, perhaps for ISO 9000, perhaps for
other corporate policy reasons.  For smaller groups, and especially
for lone writers, the setup costs (time and consultants) are likely
to exceed the benefits, much like a CMS (Content Management System)
can.  There are excellent consultants around, many on this list,
for whom it is a breeze.  If you decide to go this way, hire one.
It will prevent much anguish and hair loss.

-- Jeremy H. Griffith, at Omni Systems Inc.
   http://www.omsys.com/

>>
>>

This is misinformation, on nearly all counts. I am a lone writer who is 
completely dependent on structured Frame. Without it, I would need at least 
twice the manpower to handle the busywork that it does. Furthermore, I adhere 
to no industry standard and make changes to my structured template frequently. 

Here's is just one tiny example of what it does for me, not even the tip of the 
iceberg...

I have an element tag called "li" (list item).  When I insert, move, or copy it 
anywhere, this element:

- Automatically checks to see if it is in a lone bullet list. If so, it 
automatically applies a bullet item format
- If not, checks to see if it is in a bullet list, nested in another bullet 
list.  If so, it applies a nested bullet format
- If not, checks to see if it is in a bullet list, nested in a number list. If 
so, it applies a special nested bullet format for inside number list
- If not, checks to see if it is in a number list. If so, it then checks to see 
if it is the first one. If it is, it automatically applies a number restart 
format. Otherwise, it applies the regular number format
- If not, checks to see if it is in a nested number list. If so, it checks to 
see if it is the first one. If it is, it automatically applies a subnumber 
restart format. Otherwise, it automatically applies a regular subnumber format.
- If not, checks to see if it is in a nested number list, under a bullet list. 
If so, it then checks to see if it is the first one. If it is, it automatically 
applies a special subnumber format for restarting. If not, it applies a regular 
subnumber format.

That's just a sampling. And by the way, I didn't even mention tables. If the 
element discovers that it is in a table, it goes through this identical 
decision process with a whole different set of table-related formats. So there 
is something like 16 different paragraph formats, all represented by one tag.  
I never, ever have to think about the paragraph format.  I just know that I 
need a list item and stick it in there. The technology decides on the format 
tag for me.

Maybe you guys don't use lists, but I use lots of them.  And this is a huge 
timesaver with every single list item.  And just for a second, think about 
this... if you have to think about starting a number list at "1", there is 
something obsolete about your tool.  That's a pretty simple request, in the 
grand scheme of things.

Granted, the setup costs for me are minimal now, because I have the skill set.  
But that is the whole point of these occasional rants... you just have to get 
in there and learn, because that's when it becomes a breeze. Don't buy those 
arguments from people who say it isn't worth the time... they made the same 
exact argument some decades ago when we were all using typewriters and thinking 
about computers.  They could (and do) make the same exact arguments now when we 
are working in Word and thinking about Framemaker.  Of course it takes time to 
ramp up, but when it is so obviously the way of the future, the investment is 
worth it. If you don't make that investment, someone who did will eventually be 
doing your job.

Two final points...

- I'll retract much of what I said if you can provide a single recent example 
of anything groundbreaking in the area of techcomm that specifically involved 
unstructured content.

- Always beware of the typewriter salesman when you are reading the computer 
brochure.

Russ

--

Framemaker vs InDesign

[Steve Rickaby]

At 15:52 -0800 13/2/07, Linda Rose wrote:

>Is InDesign a suitable replacement for Framemaker for creating long,
>technical documentation?

Linda... go to  and click on the 'detailed 
FrameMaker Feature Comparison' link for a download file that contrasts 
FrameMaker and InDesign.

All this is thanks to Paul Findon, who put a lot of work into finding 
FrameMaker 'alternatives' following the demise of FrameMaker for Macintosh.

-- 
Steve

Reasons to Structure

[Steve Rickaby]

Ok, I'll hoof in line and sinker. I recently wrote a series of articles on 
structured FrameMaker, and here's what I put under 'Why should I use structured 
documents?'. The ordering is not significant, and some points have already been 
covered by others:

. A much greater level of automation becomes possible, such as the 
context-dependent application of formatting [mentioned above].

. A document's structure can be validated, that is, checked against the 
structure definition and any errors and omissions flagged.

. Structure allows design devices that would be tedious and error-prone to 
apply in unstructured FrameMaker to be wrapped in elements and used much more 
easily.

. The ability to interact with documents at a structural level makes edits to 
the structure easier and less error-prone, as well as making objects like 
markers much easier to select.

. Formatting rules within the structure definition allow document content to be 
reformatted in response to structural changes, for example changing one element 
into another with a single command and having all child elements reformat 
automatically.

. Meaning can be introduced into document structures. For example, the 
documentation of a software programming interface might include name, interface 
definition, parameter definition list, usage and error messages for each 
procedure call. Such elements can be given descriptive names in the structure 
definition, and completeness can be checked and enforced.

. Locally-applied formatting can be removed by reapplying the structure 
definition to a document.

. Document contents can be repurposed much more easily.

. Extra information about parts of a document can be introduced through the use 
of attributes, data fields that 'belong' to elements but which do not appear in 
the document itself.

. Inter-working with document tagging formats such as SGML and XML becomes 
possible.

I see that I omitted to mention the obvious point that structure allows you to 
separate structure and presentation under two separate systems of control. 

-- 
Steve

OT: Formatting Readmes with Groff/Latex

[Steve Rickaby]

At 00:43 +1300 15/2/07, rebecca officer wrote:

>Okay, I'll rise to that bait. Nothing like a nice cheerful OT war.

;-)

>I'll concede LaTeX's learning curve, and that its PDF support and font
>management sucks. But it does absolutely gorgeous equations. Easily. And
>it's got no bugs. And its bibliography engine is pretty cool.

OK, I agree. But I've never seen anything come out of LaTeX not created by a 
LaTeX expert that didn't look like an academic paper. If you want all your 
printed material to look like academic papers, or if, of course, you actually 
*write* academic papers, then that's fine. But as far as I can see, if you want 
to bend LaTeX to produce the sort of output that the rest of the world wants, 
you need to devote guru levels of time and application to it. Am I wrong?

>It's not the tool for Neil's job, but if I was writing an equation-rich
>scientific article for print, I'd choose it over FM. And I'm a long way
>from being a power user (I live with one; that helps).

I think you just proved my point ;-)

>Just my opinion, too, of course. ;-)

Yup!

-- 
Steve

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-Original Message-
From: framers-bounces+jiangw=polytrans@lists.frameusers.com
[mailto:framers-bounces+jiangw=polytrans.org at lists.frameusers.com] On Behalf
Of Claudia
Sent: Saturday, August 12, 2006 12:06 AM
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OT: Formatting Readmes with Groff/Latex

[Bodvar Bjorgvinsson]

Well, actually LaTeX is a set of macros to make writing in TeX easier
(and as such "takes over" TeX), but it is almost entirely made up of
macros to facilitate or make easier the writing of mathematical
documents and other academic papers or books.

I have not worked much in TeX or LaTeX, but it seems to me to be just
as much to learn as in the old digital typesetter software. Me, I had
one of the CompuGraphic PowerView computers with dedicated CRT and/or
film typesetters. This was LONG ago.

Learning TeX or LaTeX makes not much sense to me as long as I have
FrameMaker. But just as FM it handles big files, I have been told. But
it is for free (as in speech and as in beer), so for people with no
money and lots of time it may be worth the while.

The nearest sibling that I am using (privately, of course) is the
music engraving software LilyPond, which I believe is built on or at
least related to Scheme. But then, FrameMaker does not include Music
Engraving options.

If you have some ready made documents in LaTex, then jusst convert
them to pdf and eps and FM takes over from there.

However, in Linux/UNIX/FreeBSD etc, readme files are usually plain
text. Help files are either so-called man files or info files, both of
which are mostly used to give information on and options of how to run
a piece of software, like ls, groff, troff, man, cp, etc. Man files
are just text files set up in a simple format using groff, IIRC, which
is very easy to learn.

The info thing is a bit more complex, as it includes xrefs etc, and I
tend to avoid it as I always forget something about which keys to use
to go here and there.

Bodvar Bjorgvinsson

On 2/14/07, Steve Rickaby  wrote:
> At 00:43 +1300 15/2/07, rebecca officer wrote:
>
> >Okay, I'll rise to that bait. Nothing like a nice cheerful OT war.
>
> ;-)
>
> >I'll concede LaTeX's learning curve, and that its PDF support and font
> >management sucks. But it does absolutely gorgeous equations. Easily. And
> >it's got no bugs. And its bibliography engine is pretty cool.
>
> OK, I agree. But I've never seen anything come out of LaTeX not created by a 
> LaTeX expert that didn't look like an academic paper. If you want all your 
> printed material to look like academic papers, or if, of course, you actually 
> *write* academic papers, then that's fine. But as far as I can see, if you 
> want to bend LaTeX to produce the sort of output that the rest of the world 
> wants, you need to devote guru levels of time and application to it. Am I 
> wrong?
>
> >It's not the tool for Neil's job, but if I was writing an equation-rich
> >scientific article for print, I'd choose it over FM. And I'm a long way
> >from being a power user (I live with one; that helps).
>
> I think you just proved my point ;-)
>
> >Just my opinion, too, of course. ;-)
>
> Yup!
>
> --
> Steve
> ___
>
>
> You are currently subscribed to Framers as bodvar at gmail.com.
>
> Send list messages to framers at lists.frameusers.com.
>
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Reasons to Structure

[Bodvar Bjorgvinsson]

Matt,

I do both structured and unstructured. The need for that depends IMHO
on the contents and "structure" (or lack of) in the document(s).
However, where I have been using structure (and then I ususally set
all the formatting from within the EDD and avoid using paragraph
format tags), all updating is much easier, and my revisors are much
quicker to make their updates.

This was the short version. Don't have the time for the long version. ;-)

Bodvar

On 2/12/07, MATT TODD  wrote:
> All right...tell me good, solid reasons why a company would want to
> structure their documents. With my limited knowledge, I know structure
> effectively controls styles, fonts, etc...but I could manage that myself
> without structure. By extension, I know style control also controls
> content location because particular types of writing usually use a
> particular style...but I can also manage that myself. I know structure
> is designed to encourage single-sourcing, but I'm already headed in that
> direction without structure. I'm convinced with time and continuing
> documentation analysis, I can parse our documentation so duplicate
> verbiage in all our documents imports from one source. I can do that
> without structure. I can use conditional text to further cut down
> duplicate verbiage; it requires no structure. I can buy scripts or
> third-party software to automate documentation procedures without
> resorting to structure.
>
> So tell me...why structure documentation? I don't know enough to answer
> that question, and neither do my bosses. What's so great about it? What
> capabilities does it offer that demand its use? Right now, I'm just
> doing what I'm told, but it's always nice to found actions on solid
> reason.
>
> Matt
>
> > I'm working with legacy documentation created in Word and FM 7.0
> > unstructured. The goal is FM 7.0 structured.
>
> Whose goal is this, and why? I've seen the gee whiz demonstrations from
> Adobe reps and been utterly convinced that I Need Structured Docs Now!
> only to return to my pdf-output-only client projects that have no real
> need for structured Frame. Before committing, make sure there's a
> business case for structuring.
>
> ___
>
>
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Reasons to Structure

[John Posada]

>>MATT TODD  wrote:
>>[snip]
>>
>>So tell me...why structure documentation? I don't know enough
>>to answer that question, and neither do my bosses. What's so 
>>great about it?
>>What capabilities does it offer that demand its use? Right now, 
>>I'm just doing what I'm told, but it's always nice to found 
>>actions on solid reason.

1) It's the only way you can manage large amounts of content in a
CMS. Picture having 10,000 pieces of content being shared amoung 20
writers throughout five different writing locations, and you want to
modify one of the pieces. 

Who else is using it? 
Who will it affect?

2) Take that same amount of content. Before you start writing
something from scratch, wouldn't it be nicer (and quicker, and
cheaper) to select a piece already written and drop it into your
document? It's already been reviewed and it's accurate.

3) You receive notification that your product line is now being sold
in another country and it has to be localized. Would it make a
difference in the speed and cost if you knew that 40% of the content
is shared amoung multiple documents and 40% of the content only has
to be localized once rather that four times because it is used in
four documents?

You say nothing about your business, your document volume, nor your
writing process. Are you a single writer at a single location? Don't
do it...it brings nothing to your table that isn't superceded by the
thousands of dollars it will cost you to convert.

OTOH...multiple writers in multiple locations? Maybe.

One of the main criteria? You must be writing according to a defined
process and want to repeat the process over and over, not writing
depending on what you feel like doing at any point in time.

Don't get me wrong...the later description in the above paragraph is
not bad...it's just different than the former.

John Posada
Senior Technical Writer

"I think the problem, to be quite honest with you, is that you've never 
actually known what the question is."

Reasons to Structure

[Charles Beck]

That makes sense. Thanks. 

-Original Message-
From: Ridder, Fred [mailto:fred.rid...@intel.com] 
Subject: RE: Reasons to Structure

The point is that you tag a UI element as a UI element because it is a UI 
element. You make it bold (or whatever) at a later point in the process based 
on how you choose to format the semantically tagged elements for a given 
deliverable. The element itself is tagged according to what kind of information 
it is, so the tagging is basically meta-information that has added value to 
your content because it can be used in all sorts of post-processing operations.

Semantic tagging of in-line elements (like names of parameters and API 
functions) is so valuable that our pubs group was doing it in our Word 
documentation many before we transitioned to Frame, which was several years 
before we were acquired by Intel and even more years before Intel sold off that 
business unit and all those documents.

My opinions only; I don't speak for Intel.
Fred Ridder (fred dot ridder at intel dot com) Intel Parsippany, NJ


-Original Message-
Subject: RE: Reasons to Structure

Sorry to be so delinquent in responding to this; I have my excuses.

Some of us actually LIKE the left-brain right-brain gear shifting and are quite 
efficient at it. Mind you, I am a great proponent of structured authoring in 
theory and a miserable practitioner. Maybe it is because I am blessed with a 
mind that is peculiarly both analytical and creative in more-or-less equal 
measure. 

Besides-with the caveat that I have not actually experienced *enforced* 
structured authoring, per s?-if you need to format a word or phrase for 
emphasis or for special recognition (such as bolding UI elements), don't you 
still have to tag that content somewhere? So where is the great advantage? 

As I understand structured authoring (with my admittedly limited 
understanding), its strengths seem to lie more in the realm of freeing the 
author from having to make specific adhoc formatting decisions that may or 
(more likely) may not be consistent. That, and enforcing certain rules about 
what content is required, accepted, optional, etc. 

Is it not so? 

Chuck Beck 

Long URLs

[Stuart Rogers]

Maxwell Hoffmann wrote:

> go to the following link:
> 
> http://www.translate.com/technology/multilingual_standard/framemaker_plu
> g_ins_structure_and_localization.htm
> 
> (you may have to edit the line endings in the URL if it is broken into 2
> lines by e-mail formatting.) 

May I suggest http://tinyurl.com/ to eliminate problems like this. Just 
copy the long URL, browse to tinyurl.com, paste, and click Make TinyURL. 
The site creates a short URL (http://tinyurl.com/32c8lq in this case) 
that you can then copy and paste elsewhere.

If you use Firefox instead of that loathesome Other Product*, you can 
install an extension or add-on that gives you a menu and a right-click 
option. Each manufactures a tinyURL and copies it to your clipboard in 
one operation, ready to paste into your e-mail message. I use this all 
the time and highly recommend it.




* whose Customization screen says, "Please choose from one of the 
options below." Blech.


-- 
Stuart Rogers
Technical Communicator
Phoenix Geophysics Limited
Toronto, ON, Canada
+1 (416) 491-7340 x 325

srogers phoenix-geophysics com

"Developers explain How the Product Works.
Technical writers explain How to Work the Product."


Get Firefox!
http://tinyurl.com/8q9c5

ANN: Call for Speakers: X-Pubs 2007 - Europe's Largest XML conference, June 4-5th

[mark.pos...@mekon.com]

Call for Speakers: X-Pubs 2007 - Europe's Largest XML conference, June
4-5th



XML content management: does it really get companies the benefits they
are after - at the price promised?  



X-Pubs organises and delivers webinars, seminars, case-studies and
whitepapers from some of the industry's most valued technical minds to
educate on and promote the latest content standards. Every year X-Pubs
organises the X-Pubs Conference, Europe's Largest XML Publishing
conference.



2007 theme: 

  "How did they do it?"



Submission Deadline: 

  Speaker bios/summary (~200 words each) - Feb 20, Full presentation -
May 15



Venue: 

   Royal Berkshire Conference Centre, Reading, England (see
http://www.x-pubs.com, "Location" for more)



Submission guidelines:



This conference will take a look at real customer stories, about
currently rolled out XML solutions, which are starting to evolve their
usage over time.  X-Pubs 2006 showed us that the world is ready to start
going beyond explanation of new XML technologies and benefits, and start
discussing how to run a successful XML implementation, and drill into
the detail that leads an implementation to delivering those benefits and
their return on investment.  



In light of this, X-Pubs 2007 presentation proposals must be:

   *  Be focussed on either the technical or business aspects of an
*actual* implementation 

   *  Customer examples / case studies should be presented by, or
jointly with, the end-solution client themselves, not just by the vendor



We also welcome: 

   *  Educational, conceptual or "thought-leading" oriented
presentations, i.e., not a commercial sales pitch 

   *  We still strongly encourage that conceptual or thought-leading
presentations be delivered as much as possible in the context of, and
with specific references to, a specific project involving XML (DITA, of
course, and SGML if it's really an interesting one).  Actual clients
need not be co-presenting in this instance.



Contact: http://www.x-pubs.com / info at x-pubs.com 

+44(0)208 722 8400 / From North America 011 44 208 722 8400

Reasons to Structure

[Maxwell Hoffmann]

Matt,

Another major benefit of structured FrameMaker is "context sensitive
formatting," which I believe was mentioned before by another forum
member. An added detail is that you can reuse "generic" element tags
which will look dramatically different in different contexts.

In unstructured FrameMaker, it is not uncommon to use 3 paragraph tags
for a 3-level nested list: [bulletlist] "contains" [dashlist] which
"contains" [sqbulletlist]. In structured FrameMaker you could use a
generic element [list] and have format rules in the EDD determine that a
"second level" list contained within a list would be tagged with
paragraph [dashlist] while a "third level" list contained within a list
contained within a list would be tagged with paragraph [sqbulletlist].
In the structured editor, if you were to select a 3rd level nested
[list] element and dynamically drag it to the 2nd level, it will
automatically reformat and be tagged with [dashlist] instead of
[sqbulletlist].

The key benefit is that users have fewer tags to deal with. In an actual
customer example, we had a client who was using over 130 paragraph tags
(including paragraph variants like [BulletListLast], [DashListLast],
[WhateveListLast].) In most of these cases, such paragraphs were
identical to normal list paragraphs, but had extra space below paragraph
to ensure that the last item in the list did not "slam" into the next
paragraph. We developed a structured FrameMaker application for this
client with format rules in the EDD which ensured that the last
[ListItem] element contained in a [List] element has extra space below
it. As a result, our client moved from using over 130 PARAGRAPH tags to
about 40 frequently used ELEMENT tags. Our client observed that it
became easier for new staff to master rather complex document template
rules. NOTE: this client had about 5 tech writers working on very high
volume documentation with consistent formatting and structure. Average
FrameMaker books were about 400pp long.

Another benefit from the transition to structure was that the tech
writers produced more consistent document structure. Due to the lack of
random character level format overrides, there was less "touch up" to
formatting in post-translation documents, which reduced billable time on
translation projects. Format proofing time was greatly reduced, which
was magnified by the 11 languages XML extracted from FrameMaker was
translated into.

Structured FrameMaker *does* require a lot of work up front,
establishing the EDD if you have complex formatting, but it is well
worth the effort and you will gain a return on investment fairly
quickly. I hope that this helps.


>MATT TODD  wrote:
>[snip]
>
>So tell me...why structure documentation? I don't know enough to
answer
>that question, and neither do my bosses. What's so great about it?
What
>capabilities does it offer that demand its use? Right now, I'm just
>doing what I'm told, but it's always nice to found actions on solid
>reason.
>
>Matt


Maxwell Hoffmann
Manager of Consulting & Training Solutions
ENLASO Corporation
T: 805 494 9571 * F: 805 435 1920
E: mhoffmann at translate.com 
ENLASO Corporation provides quality enterprise language solutions and
exceeds client expectations through continuing research, development,
and implementation of effective localization processes and technologies.

Visit: www.translate.com for more information or to subscribe to our
complimentary localization newsletter. 

Vista and font cache

[Dov Isaacs]

Rebecca,

We honestly don't know what is causing the problem other than that
deleting
the Windows font cache clears the symptoms at least for a while (where
for
some "a while" is longer than for others). The problem seems to be
shared
by Windows 2000 and XP (which share a tremendous amount of code). 
We did not see it with Windows'9x or Windows NT 4, both of which have 
significantly different text/font handling mechanisms than Windows 2000
and XP. I haven't heard of anyone encountering the problem with Vista,
but that doesn't mean that it is exempt either since the GDI-based text
and font handling is based on that of Windows XP.

My observation is that if you indeed encounter the problem even once on
a 
particular system, you should assume that you are likely to encounter it
again
on that system and as such, you should proactively delete the font cache
and
reboot on a regular basis. What is a regular basis? Your guess is as
good as
mine. Of those who have "fixed" the problem by doing the font cache
deletion 
and reboot, I haven't heard of anyone getting the problem back that
quickly
(i.e., within hours or days or even a week). If I was to start seeing
the symptom
occur on my system, I would configure my system to have a system
shutdown
script that would delete the font cache every time the system shutdown
(which
is part of every reboot). Since reboots occur most times you do a
Microsoft
Windows Update (for example, yesterday was "Patch Tuesday"), you would
probably get a clean font cache at least once a month if not more
frequently.
If you shutdown the computer once a day, then you get a clean font cache
daily.

What is the cost of having a new font cache? As far as I can determine,
not
much. I have yet to see any performance hit when deleting a font cache
and rebooting other than the time to delete the font cache and reboot.

With regards to any "fixes" -- the problem is not readily reproducible
and
as such we can't instrument FrameMaker to look for where we can change
any code to prevent the problem. My comments about old GDI calls is
guesswork on my part based on a few hunches, the technical details of
which I will not bore this list with.

- Dov




From: rebecca officer [mailto:rebecca.offi...@alliedtelesis.co.nz] 
Sent: Tuesday, February 13, 2007 6:38 PM
To: Dov Isaacs
Cc: Framers (E-mail); FrameMaker Discussion Forum
Subject: RE: Vista and font cache



Hi Dov

Are you saying that deleting the font cache and rebooting should
get
rid of the symptoms for a while, regardless of the size of the
font
cache after reboot?

My memory of last year's posts was that you had to also reduce
the size
of the font cache by deleting big unused fonts. I did that a few
months
ago and my font cache is now around 770 KB. But a document
showed the
symptoms again a couple of days ago. Is that what you'd expect?

Next time I have a document with symptoms, I'll try just
deleting the
cache and rebooting.

Also, does your email mean that Adobe are hunting for those "old
Windows GDI calls made by FrameMaker" to fix the bug?

Thanks, Rebecca

>>> "Dov Isaacs"  14/02/07 10:42 >>>
The symptom was reported against FrameMaker internally.
The problem has been seen in printing to PostScript
printers and as such, cannot be traced in any way to
Distiller (or the AdobePDF PostScript printer driver
instance). The symptom is not directly reproducible;
all we know is that by deleting the FNTCACHE.DAT file
and rebooting, the problem goes away, at least for a
while. Since FrameMaker does not and cannot directly
access or manipulate the FNTCACHE.DAT file, the likely
cause of the bug are old Windows GDI calls made by
FrameMaker that are still supported by Windows, but
in which some bug associated with font caching crept
in over the years.

- Dov

Reasons to Structure

[Peter Gold]

Maxwell Hoffmann wrote:
> Matt,
>
> Another major benefit of structured FrameMaker is "context sensitive
> formatting," which I believe was mentioned before by another forum
> member. An added detail is that you can reuse "generic" element tags
> which will look dramatically different in different contexts.
>
>   
Hi, Matt:

Maxwell's point and example about how useful context-sensitive 
formatting rules can be is right on. However, this ability to interpret 
the rules you create in your EDD, blurs the line between several aspects 
of structured FrameMaker. Structured element design is required so the 
rules know each element's "identity," or definition. The rules can't 
function without clear instructions and clear identification of each 
element.

It's something like you can't have a terrific automatic 
zillion-position-adjustable-programmable-memory car seat without having 
the car, the power to run the seat, and having spent the time learning 
to adjust the seat, to capture the settings for each user, and how to 
recall each user's setting.

Context-sensitive formatting is terrific! No doubt about it. But, you 
get the most return on your learning investment by having documents that 
often require the kind of manual effort that's worth turning over to the 
smart rules-inforcer, to gain efficiency.

HTH

Regards,

Peter Gold
KnowHow ProServices

Trouble with cross-references

[pearlrosenb...@nc.rr.com]

Hi Framers,

FrameMaker 7.p576
Windows XP Professional

I have a book with 17 chapters. Every time I open the chapters in it, 
for six of the chapters I get a message that there are unresolved 
cross-references. There are six other chapters with cross-references 
that do not generate this message.

Each time, I search for the unresolved cross-references (every cross-
reference in each of these chapters), double-click on each, replace it 
with the one in the cross-reference dialog box, and save the file. 
Then I save all the files in the book and save and close the book. The 
next time I open the book, the same cross-references are unresolved 
again.

I created this book from an earlier version by copying the files from 
the old directory to a new one. Then I opened FrameMaker, created a 
new book, and added the files to the new book.

Any suggestions on how I can fix this? BTW, when the cross-references 
are unresolved, they correctly identify the heads, chapters, page 
numbers, and so forth.

Trouble with cross-references

[Art Campbell]

Have you tried "washing" the chapters by saving as .mif files,
reopening them, and saving as .fm?

Art

On 2/14/07, pearlrosenberg at nc.rr.com  wrote:
> Hi Framers,
>
> FrameMaker 7.p576
> Windows XP Professional
>
> I have a book with 17 chapters. Every time I open the chapters in it,
> for six of the chapters I get a message that there are unresolved
> cross-references. There are six other chapters with cross-references
> that do not generate this message.
>
> Each time, I search for the unresolved cross-references (every cross-
> reference in each of these chapters), double-click on each, replace it
> with the one in the cross-reference dialog box, and save the file.
> Then I save all the files in the book and save and close the book. The
> next time I open the book, the same cross-references are unresolved
> again.
>
> I created this book from an earlier version by copying the files from
> the old directory to a new one. Then I opened FrameMaker, created a
> new book, and added the files to the new book.
>
> Any suggestions on how I can fix this? BTW, when the cross-references
> are unresolved, they correctly identify the heads, chapters, page
> numbers, and so forth.
> ___

-- 
Art Campbell art.campbell at 
gmail.com
  "... In my opinion, there's nothing in this world beats a '52 Vincent
   and a redheaded girl." -- Richard Thompson
 No disclaimers apply.
 DoD 358

Trouble with cross-references

[Combs, Richard]

pearlrosenberg at nc.rr.com wrote: 

> I have a book with 17 chapters. Every time I open the 
> chapters in it, for six of the chapters I get a message that 
> there are unresolved cross-references. There are six other 
> chapters with cross-references that do not generate this message.
> 
> Each time, I search for the unresolved cross-references 
> (every cross- reference in each of these chapters), 
> double-click on each, replace it with the one in the 
> cross-reference dialog box, and save the file. 
> Then I save all the files in the book and save and close the 
> book. The next time I open the book, the same 
> cross-references are unresolved again.

It's possible that the problem lies with the destination files, not the
files containing the xrefs. 
To check or update an xref, FM must "silently" (in the background,
without you noticing) open the file that the xref points to. If that
file has a problem like a missing font or graphic, FM can't open the
file silently, so it can't check the xref's destination ("resolve" it).
Once you open the file, responding to the dialog about missing fonts or
whatever, the xref is no longer unresolved. 

Try this: From the book file, hold down the Shift key and click File >
Open All Files in Book. If I'm on the right track, you'll be prompted
about missing fonts or something before some of the files open. Once
they're all open, a search for unresolved xrefs won't find any. 

HTH!
Richard


--
Richard G. Combs
Senior Technical Writer
Polycom, Inc.
richardDOTcombs AT polycomDOTcom
303-223-5111
--
rgcombs AT gmailDOTcom
303-777-0436
--

Reasons to Structure

[Daniel Emory]

No one has mentioned the potential for greatly
improving writer productivity, as well as eliminating
format overrides. 

Once authors are up to speed on using the structure
view and the element catalog, they're freed from the
entire formatting burden (if the EDD specifies
context-based format rules). I see no reason why this
productivity advantage would diminish for relatively
small documents.

And, unlike unstructured Frame, re-importing the EDD
into a structured document with "Remove Format
Overrides" turned on will eliminate every single
instance in which authors overrode the EDD-specified
formatting. When authors realize this step is part of
the review process, they know the jig is up.
-

Reasons to Structure

[Daniel Emory]

--- Charles Beck  wrote:
> Besides-with the caveat that I have not actually
> experienced *enforced* structured authoring, per
> s?-if you need to format a word or phrase for
> emphasis or for special recognition (such as bolding
> UI elements), don't you still have to tag that
> content somewhere? So where is the great advantage?
===
Semantic tagging of a word or phrase can be
implemented by wrapping it with an EDD-defined
text-range element whose element name describes the
semantic type. A format rule in the EDD automatically
applies the correct format to it.  

> As I understand structured authoring (with my
> admittedly limited understanding), its strengths
> seem to lie more in the realm of freeing the author
> from having to make specific adhoc formatting
> decisions that may or (more likely) may not be
> consistent. That, and enforcing certain rules about
> what content is required, accepted, optional, etc.
===
In a properly designed EDD, there is no such thing as
ad-hoc formatting. That is, Format rules define all
formatting. These format rules can be based on one or
more of the following: element name, element context,
element attribute value(s), and format change lists
referenced from within the format rules. Typically,
full use of these capabilities can drastically reduce
the number of paragraph and character formats required
in a FrameMaker template. I could go on to describe
numerous other advantages of this approach to
formatting.

Typically, full use of  

Trouble with cross-references

[pearlrosenb...@nc.rr.com]

Richard,
I think this is on the right track. When I open the files, every one 
displays a msg saying the file uses unavailable fonts and that 
clicking OK will reformat the file with available fonts. I've click OK 
for every file numerous times and the files open and before I close 
them, I save them, but the next time I open them, I get the same 
messages.
How could I have created the files with unavailable fonts? And more 
importantly, how do I fix this? This is particulary important bec I 
anticipate many updates to this manual and this iteration will be the 
basis for the next.
Thanks in advance for your help.
Pearl

- Original Message -
From: "Combs, Richard" 
Date: Wednesday, February 14, 2007 4:38 pm
Subject: RE: Trouble with cross-references
To: pearlrosenberg at nc.rr.com, framers at frameUsers.com

> pearlrosenberg at nc.rr.com wrote: 
> 
> > I have a book with 17 chapters. Every time I open the 
> > chapters in it, for six of the chapters I get a message that 
> > there are unresolved cross-references. There are six other 
> > chapters with cross-references that do not generate this message.
> > 
> > Each time, I search for the unresolved cross-references 
> > (every cross- reference in each of these chapters), 
> > double-click on each, replace it with the one in the 
> > cross-reference dialog box, and save the file. 
> > Then I save all the files in the book and save and close the 
> > book. The next time I open the book, the same 
> > cross-references are unresolved again.
> 
> It's possible that the problem lies with the destination files, 
> not the
> files containing the xrefs. 
> To check or update an xref, FM must "silently" (in the background,
> without you noticing) open the file that the xref points to. If that
> file has a problem like a missing font or graphic, FM can't open the
> file silently, so it can't check the xref's destination ("resolve" 
> it).Once you open the file, responding to the dialog about missing 
> fonts or
> whatever, the xref is no longer unresolved. 
> 
> Try this: From the book file, hold down the Shift key and click 
> File >
> Open All Files in Book. If I'm on the right track, you'll be prompted
> about missing fonts or something before some of the files open. Once
> they're all open, a search for unresolved xrefs won't find any. 
> 
> HTH!
> Richard
> 
> 
> --
> Richard G. Combs
> Senior Technical Writer
> Polycom, Inc.
> richardDOTcombs AT polycomDOTcom
> 303-223-5111
> --
> rgcombs AT gmailDOTcom
> 303-777-0436
> --
> 
> 
> 
> 

Trouble with cross-references

[pearlrosenb...@nc.rr.com]

Thanks, Art. I tried this. I converted the fm files to mif, converted 
the mif files to fm, and then cleaned up all the x-refs and saved the 
files. Unfortunately, when I opened the book again, the x-refs were ng.

- Original Message -
From: Art Campbell 
Date: Wednesday, February 14, 2007 4:24 pm
Subject: Re: Trouble with cross-references
To: "pearlrosenberg at nc.rr.com" 
Cc: framers at frameusers.com

> Have you tried "washing" the chapters by saving as .mif files,
> reopening them, and saving as .fm?
> 
> Art
> 
> On 2/14/07, pearlrosenberg at nc.rr.com  
wrote:
> > Hi Framers,
> >
> > FrameMaker 7.p576
> > Windows XP Professional
> >
> > I have a book with 17 chapters. Every time I open the chapters 
> in it,
> > for six of the chapters I get a message that there are unresolved
> > cross-references. There are six other chapters with cross-
references
> > that do not generate this message.
> >
> > Each time, I search for the unresolved cross-references (every 
> cross-
> > reference in each of these chapters), double-click on each, 
> replace it
> > with the one in the cross-reference dialog box, and save the file.
> > Then I save all the files in the book and save and close the 
> book. The
> > next time I open the book, the same cross-references are unresolved
> > again.
> >
> > I created this book from an earlier version by copying the files 
> from> the old directory to a new one. Then I opened FrameMaker, 
> created a
> > new book, and added the files to the new book.
> >
> > Any suggestions on how I can fix this? BTW, when the cross-
> references> are unresolved, they correctly identify the heads, 
> chapters, page
> > numbers, and so forth.
> > ___
> 
> -- 
> Art Campbell 
> art.campbell at gmail.com  "... In my opinion, there's nothing in 
> this world beats a '52 Vincent
>   and a redheaded girl." -- Richard Thompson
> No disclaimers apply.
> DoD 358
> 

Trouble with cross-references

[Combs, Richard]

pearlrosenberg at nc.rr.com wrote:

> Richard,
> I think this is on the right track. When I open the files, 
> every one displays a msg saying the file uses unavailable 
> fonts and that clicking OK will reformat the file with 
> available fonts. I've click OK for every file numerous times 
> and the files open and before I close them, I save them, but 
> the next time I open them, I get the same messages.

If you're happy with the available fonts, do this get rid of the
unavailable ones for good: 

1) With all the files in your book closed, select File > Preferences. In
the dialog, uncheck Remember Missing Font Names and click Set. 

2) Open all the files in your book. You'll get the unavailable fonts
message one more time for each. Confirm that you want to replace the
unavailable fonts. 

3) Save all the files in your book and close them. 

4) Open the files again. They should open without any unavailable fonts
messages. 

HTH!
Richard


--
Richard G. Combs
Senior Technical Writer
Polycom, Inc.
richardDOTcombs AT polycomDOTcom
303-223-5111
--
rgcombs AT gmailDOTcom
303-777-0436
--

Trouble with cross-references

[John Posada]

> How could I have created the files with unavailable fonts? And more
> importantly, how do I fix this? This is particulary important bec I
> anticipate many updates to this manual and this iteration will be
> the 
> basis for the next.
> Thanks in advance for your help.
> Pearl

You probably didn't. However, you might have brought in other content
that did. You might be using EPS and they include their own fonts. 

Change your setting for:

File -> Prefernces -> General -> Remember Missing Font Names

John Posada
Senior Technical Writer

"I think the problem, to be quite honest with you, is that you've never 
actually known what the question is."

Trouble with cross-references

[Ridder, Fred]

But after you're done clearing the missing font references,
do return to File>Preferences and turn the remember Missing
Fonts item back on because it is normally a good thing.
This is particularly true if you ever work on files that 
originated someplace else (e.g. a client) and that will be 
returned after you work on them. If you have the "Remember..."
option turned off, you may be returning files that use very
different fonts than they did when you received them--not a
nice thing to do to a client's files.

My opinions only; I don't speak for Intel.
Fred Ridder (fred dot ridder at intel dot com)
Intel
Parsippany, NJ


-Original Message-
From: framers-bounces+fred.ridder=intel@lists.frameusers.com
[mailto:framers-bounces+fred.ridder=intel.com at lists.frameusers.com] On
Behalf Of Combs, Richard
Sent: Wednesday, February 14, 2007 5:37 PM
To: pearlrosenberg at nc.rr.com
Cc: framers at frameUsers.com
Subject: RE: RE: Trouble with cross-references

pearlrosenberg at nc.rr.com wrote:

> Richard,
> I think this is on the right track. When I open the files, 
> every one displays a msg saying the file uses unavailable 
> fonts and that clicking OK will reformat the file with 
> available fonts. I've click OK for every file numerous times 
> and the files open and before I close them, I save them, but 
> the next time I open them, I get the same messages.

If you're happy with the available fonts, do this get rid of the
unavailable ones for good: 

1) With all the files in your book closed, select File > Preferences. In
the dialog, uncheck Remember Missing Font Names and click Set. 

2) Open all the files in your book. You'll get the unavailable fonts
message one more time for each. Confirm that you want to replace the
unavailable fonts. 

3) Save all the files in your book and close them. 

4) Open the files again. They should open without any unavailable fonts
messages. 

HTH!
Richard

Trouble with cross-references

[White, William]

Hi Framers
I encountered something that sounds very similar to this. I inherited a
years-old project with multiple chapters that had undergone a number of
revisions. Every time I attempted to generate a PDF of the entire Book
the beast would die on me about 3/4 of the way through. 

It turns out that my villainous predecessors were in the habit of
renaming the files at every revision to keep track of the versioning and
the chapter order. (They appear to have never discovered the function of
the Display Heading Text/Show Filename toggle in the Book view - a
surprisingly common bit of ignorance among tyro Framers - so they didn't
know how to tell if the chapters were in the desired order without
hacking the filename to include some indication of the chapter number
AND revision number.) Consequently there were legacy X-refs to headings
in chapters that were still in the book, but which contained the old
filename in their XRef definitions. I presume this happened because my
predecessors didn't use the Rename File function in the book view, but
probably renamed the files outside FM. 

I tried the flush-through-MIF routine which did not solve the problem
since the legacy X-refs were still there. By chance during one of the
failed PDF generation attempts I got a glimpse of the offending legacy
file name, and was able to track the offending X-ref down in the MIF
where I found that the  tag contained an ancient file name.
As soon as I deleted that one single nasty  tag from the MIF
everything worked happily from then on out. 

It would seem to be a doable task for some script-happy person to write
a tool that would parse through a book's MIFs and delete all the 
tags that contain out-of-date file names. (Obviously the user would have
to supply a listing of legitimate current file names.) I'm a bit
surprised that FM didn't handle some of this cleanup by itself, but
these were SERIOUSLY abused documents so I can't fault the software.

Hope this helps.

Will White

-Original Message-
From: framers-bounces+wwhite=onelambda@lists.frameusers.com
[mailto:framers-bounces+wwhite=onelambda.com at lists.frameusers.com] On
Behalf Of pearlrosenberg at nc.rr.com
Sent: Wednesday, February 14, 2007 1:06 PM
To: framers at frameUsers.com
Subject: Trouble with cross-references

Hi Framers,

FrameMaker 7.p576
Windows XP Professional

I have a book with 17 chapters. Every time I open the chapters in it,
for six of the chapters I get a message that there are unresolved
cross-references. There are six other chapters with cross-references
that do not generate this message.

Each time, I search for the unresolved cross-references (every cross-
reference in each of these chapters), double-click on each, replace it
with the one in the cross-reference dialog box, and save the file. 
Then I save all the files in the book and save and close the book. The
next time I open the book, the same cross-references are unresolved
again.

I created this book from an earlier version by copying the files from
the old directory to a new one. Then I opened FrameMaker, created a new
book, and added the files to the new book.

Any suggestions on how I can fix this? BTW, when the cross-references
are unresolved, they correctly identify the heads, chapters, page
numbers, and so forth.
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Reasons to Structure

[Jeremy H. Griffith]

On Wed, 14 Feb 2007 04:56:49 -0700, russ at weststreetconsulting.com 
wrote:

>Jeremy Griffith wrote [referring to semantic markup]:
>
>>You can do the same with paragraph formats, too.  But you can
>>do all that in UNstructured docs just as easily as in structured.
>>Maybe *more* easily, when you factor in the time to set up your
>>structure, and to modify it when you make changes, which is major.  
>>
>>I've only been able to identify one situation in which structured 
>>Frame can do this better than unstructured, and that's when you'd 
>>want nested element tags within a paragraph, since you cam't nest 
>>character formats.  (There are easy workarounds for creating the 
>>equivalent of nested paragraph formats, such as using start/end 
>>formats and/or markers.)  OTOH, I have yet to see a non-hypothetical 
>>case where such nested char formats were really needed...
>>
>>Structured Frame is designed for large pubs groups where standard
>>document designs are required, perhaps for ISO 9000, perhaps for
>>other corporate policy reasons.  For smaller groups, and especially
>>for lone writers, the setup costs (time and consultants) are likely
>>to exceed the benefits, much like a CMS (Content Management System)
>>can.  There are excellent consultants around, many on this list,
>>for whom it is a breeze.  If you decide to go this way, hire one.
>>It will prevent much anguish and hair loss.

>This is misinformation, on nearly all counts. 

Isn't that a tad harsh, Russ?  My point, which you appear to have 
missed, is that (as Richard said) semantic markup is good, *and*
that you can do it in unstructured Frame.  Do you deny this fact?

I also said that for small groups, "the setup costs (time and 
consultants) are likely to exceed the benefits".  I'll stand by
that assessment, based on using Frame in both its unstructured 
*and* structured (formerly known as "FrameBuilder") forms over
many, many years, originally on a Sun 2...  I didn't say there
are *no* benefits, just that the costs may be greater.  Do you
assert that the costs are always insignificant, then?

>I am a lone writer who is completely dependent on structured Frame. 
>Without it, I would need at least twice the manpower to handle the 
>busywork that it does. Furthermore, I adhere to no industry standard 
>and make changes to my structured template frequently. 

All well and good... but what *else* are you?  An expert in
structure, perhaps?  How long have you worked with structure?
As I said, "There are excellent consultants around, many on 
this list, for whom it is a breeze."  You are one of the four 
or five I'd think of first...  Here's the first line on your
home page: "Welcome to West Street Consulting, your home for 
structured FrameMaker? plugins and other utilities."  I've
also written plugins that work with structured Frame (Mif2Go
does, just fine), but I hardly consider myself a representative
Frame user... nor would I assume that everyone would have as
easy a time as I do.  Do you say it's easy for everyone?

>Granted, the setup costs for me are minimal now, because I 
>have the skill set.  

My point exactly.  That's why I said "hire a consultant".
Do you think consultants are unnecessary?  

>But that is the whole point of these occasional rants... you 
>just have to get in there and learn, because that's when it 
>becomes a breeze. 

Assuming, that is, that you *have* the time.  Many of our
colleagues, having survived downsizing from ten writers to
two with no decrease of workload, do not.  And if you do,
is that time better spent on learning nifty new tools, or
on improving the docs you're paid to write?  One size does
*not* fit all.  If you have a genuine *business* case for
going to structured Frame (or if you are a hacker at heart, 
like you and I), go for it.  ;-)

>Of course it takes time to ramp up, but when it is so 
>obviously the way of the future, ...

This makes me feel old.Well, I *am* old... old
enough to remember any number of "obvious" advances that
went nowhere.  The future has many ways... most of which
we won't recognize until we get there.  Here's a little
related snippet from [XML-DEV] today:

> [Michael Chanpion:] On the other hand, this is more or less 
> the story of CORBA ? lots of time and money spent on something 
> that has vastly underperformed relative to its initial hype.

> [Elliotte Rusty Harold:] Exactly, and that's hardly the only 
> example of lots of corporate money being fed into the shredder.

That's in the current "More predictions to mull over" thread...

>Two final points...
>
>- I'll retract much of what I said if you can provide a single 
>recent example of anything groundbreaking in the area of techcomm 
>that specifically involved unstructured content.

The Web?  You don't consider HTML an example of structured
content, do you?  It qualifies in only the most technical 
sense... and most pages violate even its simple DTDs grossly.
Or maybe it's not recent enough for you?

>- Always bew

Introducing Technical Writing, Tools, and Process to Teams in the Company

[Roopa Belur]

Hello Framers,

  The Publications team in our company is planning on a company-wide spree to 
introduce (in some cases, re-introduce) ourselves, and briefly enlighten the 
key groups in our company on:

  - What is Publications
- Why we document
  - How we document 
  - Who is our audience

  As I am leading the effort for this promotion, I need your help in:

  - Have you all done anything similar
  - If yes, how often do you give presentations
  - What do you cover
  - What is the best way to introduce Tools/processes 

  I want to start the session with an interactive technical writing task, so 
people have context to the PPT presentation. What are some of the good 
exercises to target for a mixed audience of developers, Support, Operations, 
and product managers?

  Any ideas/suggestions/comments/websites will help. 

Rgds,
Roopa Belur







"We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give."
Sir Winston Churchill









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List of Figures

[Randall C. Reed]

I slept through this part of Professor O'Keefe's lecture on using
building blocks when making generated lists, so I'm stumped on what
should be very easy:

I'm doing an LOF that needs to be:

  tab  tab 

Where the Page Number is a compound running H/F = ( -
)

I got <$pagenum>, but that just gets me the last half.

What building block do I use to get both parts of the running H/F?

Color me "Duh?"

Thanks,
Randy





This material contains confidential and proprietary information of Force 
Protection, Inc. and its subsidiaries. Copying this material or disclosing such 
information to others without the Company's prior consent is prohibited. This 
material may also contain technical data relating to a "Defense Article" within 
the meaning of the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (22 CFR Part 120). 
The transfer or disclosure of this information to any non-U.S. person or 
company without any required export license approved by the United States 
Department of State, Directorate of Defense Trade Controls may be prohibited 
under federal law.
Force Protection Industries, Inc.

Figure Numbering Problem

[Howard Rauch]

I am having a problem numbering figures in service manuals developed by my 
client. The manuals are range from 3- to 40 pages. My job is to revise the 
client's existing manuals to account for annual updates and design changes for 
each of my client's products. We are both using FrameMaker 7.0 on a PC platform 
and a Windows XP operating system..

Figures are automatically numbered using a Figure tag for which the automatic 
numbering format X:Figure  (developed by the client). Most are smaller 
in-column figures with a ruling line around the figure frame. In previous 
versions of the manuals, the client had placed the figure numbers outside the 
frame, but now they have asked me to move them inside the frame, so I set up a 
text box inside the graphics frame and tag the text as Figure. What happens is 
that many times, figure numbers will repeat themselves. For example, I may have 
three or four consecutive figures numbered as Figure 4, followed by Figure 5 
and two figures numbered as Figure 6. All text is part of the same flow. The 
only way I have found to correct it is to override the automatic numbering with 
a specific figure number, which of course defeats the purpose of auto numbering.

The manual I am currently working on has 30 figures. I created the last 6 or 7 
and inserted the text box for the figure. When I tagged the text the numbers 
for each figure was identical. I also noticed in making cross-references that 
the figure numbers in the tag list were not in sequence. Example Figure 9 
appeared before Figure 8.

The only items automatically numbered in the manuals are page numbers in a 
footer on the underlying page and the figure numbers. Is it necessary to set up 
the automatic numbering format as X:Figure < =0>?

Howard Rauch


Technology Transfer, Inc.
"Linking Creators and Users of Technology"
933 North 18th Street
Manitowoc WI 54220
Office: 920-682-1528
Cell: 920-629-0080

"Go to" problem

[Howard Rauch]

This is more of a nuisance than a problem, but it does indicate that something 
is wrong with the FrameMaker file.

When I use the "Go to Page" in my client's manuals, the software goes to that 
page and immediately reverts to page 1. I must repeat the process to get the 
software to go to the desired page and stay there. Any suggestions?

Howard Rauch

Technology Transfer, Inc.
"Linking Creators and Users of Technology"
933 North 18th Street
Manitowoc WI 54220
Office: 920-682-1528
Cell: 920-629-0080

Re: Framemaker vs InDesign

[Yves Barbion]

I agree with Dov and Ann too.

And you can add this to the list:

  - XML with DITA
  - Tables and table formats (especially with the great, inexpensive
  TableCleaner plug-in)
  - Cross-references
  - Conditional text
  - Cross-channel publishing with WebWorks Publisher (and maybe other
  Help authoring tools)


--
Yves Barbion
Documentation Architect
Adobe-Certified FrameMaker Instructor

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Re: OT: Formatting Readmes with Groff/Latex

[Steve Rickaby]

At 15:16 -0500 13/2/07, Neil Tubb wrote:

>I've been told I have to produce Readmes for several of our products in
>text files. I want to be able to control some basic look-and-feel
>though, such as column-width, and it was suggested to me to use Groff or
>Latex. I've been looking into this for a bit, but can't really figure it
>out. Before I spend any more time on this, does anyone have a better
>solution?

Avoid LaTeX like the plague. It has a learning curve in excess of FrameMaker's. 
Follows Art's advice.

TeX/LaTeX is a dinosaur wallowing in the tar-pit of 8-bit systems and smells of 
musty storerooms where card-punch machines have gone to die. It is horrendously 
arcane and completely rooted in the past.

Just my opinion, of course ;-)

-- 
Steve
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Re: OT: Formatting Readmes with Groff/Latex

[rebecca officer]

Okay, I'll rise to that bait. Nothing like a nice cheerful OT war.

I'll concede LaTeX's learning curve, and that its PDF support and font
management sucks. But it does absolutely gorgeous equations. Easily. And
it's got no bugs. And its bibliography engine is pretty cool.

It's not the tool for Neil's job, but if I was writing an equation-rich
scientific article for print, I'd choose it over FM. And I'm a long way
from being a power user (I live with one; that helps).

Just my opinion, too, of course. ;-)

Rebecca

>>> Steve Rickaby <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 02/14/07 11:55 PM
>>>
At 15:16 -0500 13/2/07, Neil Tubb wrote:

>I've been told I have to produce Readmes for several of our products in
>text files. I want to be able to control some basic look-and-feel
>though, such as column-width, and it was suggested to me to use Groff
or
>Latex. I've been looking into this for a bit, but can't really figure
it
>out. Before I spend any more time on this, does anyone have a better
>solution?

Avoid LaTeX like the plague. It has a learning curve in excess of
FrameMaker's. Follows Art's advice.

TeX/LaTeX is a dinosaur wallowing in the tar-pit of 8-bit systems and
smells of musty storerooms where card-punch machines have gone to die.
It is horrendously arcane and completely rooted in the past.

Just my opinion, of course ;-)

-- 
Steve
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RE: Reasons to Structure

[russ]

Jeremy Griffith, write:



You can do the same with paragraph formats, too.  But you can
do all that in UNstructured docs just as easily as in structured.
Maybe *more* easily, when you factor in the time to set up your
structure, and to modify it when you make changes, which is major.  

I've only been able to identify one situation in which structured 
Frame can do this better than unstructured, and that's when you'd 
want nested element tags within a paragraph, since you cam't nest 
character formats.  (There are easy workarounds for creating the 
equivalent of nested paragraph formats, such as using start/end 
formats and/or markers.)  OTOH, I have yet to see a non-hypothetical 
case where such nested char formats were really needed...

Structured Frame is designed for large pubs groups where standard
document designs are required, perhaps for ISO 9000, perhaps for
other corporate policy reasons.  For smaller groups, and especially
for lone writers, the setup costs (time and consultants) are likely
to exceed the benefits, much like a CMS (Content Management System)
can.  There are excellent consultants around, many on this list,
for whom it is a breeze.  If you decide to go this way, hire one.
It will prevent much anguish and hair loss.

-- Jeremy H. Griffith, at Omni Systems Inc.
 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  http://www.omsys.com/

>>
>>

This is misinformation, on nearly all counts. I am a lone writer who is 
completely dependent on structured Frame. Without it, I would need at least 
twice the manpower to handle the busywork that it does. Furthermore, I adhere 
to no industry standard and make changes to my structured template frequently. 

Here's is just one tiny example of what it does for me, not even the tip of the 
iceberg...

I have an element tag called "li" (list item).  When I insert, move, or copy it 
anywhere, this element:

- Automatically checks to see if it is in a lone bullet list. If so, it 
automatically applies a bullet item format
- If not, checks to see if it is in a bullet list, nested in another bullet 
list.  If so, it applies a nested bullet format
- If not, checks to see if it is in a bullet list, nested in a number list. If 
so, it applies a special nested bullet format for inside number list
- If not, checks to see if it is in a number list. If so, it then checks to see 
if it is the first one. If it is, it automatically applies a number restart 
format. Otherwise, it applies the regular number format
- If not, checks to see if it is in a nested number list. If so, it checks to 
see if it is the first one. If it is, it automatically applies a subnumber 
restart format. Otherwise, it automatically applies a regular subnumber format.
- If not, checks to see if it is in a nested number list, under a bullet list. 
If so, it then checks to see if it is the first one. If it is, it automatically 
applies a special subnumber format for restarting. If not, it applies a regular 
subnumber format.

That's just a sampling. And by the way, I didn't even mention tables. If the 
element discovers that it is in a table, it goes through this identical 
decision process with a whole different set of table-related formats. So there 
is something like 16 different paragraph formats, all represented by one tag.  
I never, ever have to think about the paragraph format.  I just know that I 
need a list item and stick it in there. The technology decides on the format 
tag for me.

Maybe you guys don't use lists, but I use lots of them.  And this is a huge 
timesaver with every single list item.  And just for a second, think about 
this... if you have to think about starting a number list at "1", there is 
something obsolete about your tool.  That's a pretty simple request, in the 
grand scheme of things.

Granted, the setup costs for me are minimal now, because I have the skill set.  
But that is the whole point of these occasional rants... you just have to get 
in there and learn, because that's when it becomes a breeze. Don't buy those 
arguments from people who say it isn't worth the time... they made the same 
exact argument some decades ago when we were all using typewriters and thinking 
about computers.  They could (and do) make the same exact arguments now when we 
are working in Word and thinking about Framemaker.  Of course it takes time to 
ramp up, but when it is so obviously the way of the future, the investment is 
worth it. If you don't make that investment, someone who did will eventually be 
doing your job.

Two final points...

- I'll retract much of what I said if you can provide a single recent example 
of anything groundbreaking in the area of techcomm that specifically involved 
unstructured content.

- Always beware of the typewriter salesman when you are reading the computer 
brochure.

Russ

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Re: Framemaker vs InDesign

[Steve Rickaby]

At 15:52 -0800 13/2/07, Linda Rose wrote:

>Is InDesign a suitable replacement for Framemaker for creating long,
>technical documentation?

Linda... go to  and click on the 'detailed 
FrameMaker Feature Comparison' link for a download file that contrasts 
FrameMaker and InDesign.

All this is thanks to Paul Findon, who put a lot of work into finding 
FrameMaker 'alternatives' following the demise of FrameMaker for Macintosh.

-- 
Steve
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RE: Reasons to Structure

[Steve Rickaby]

Ok, I'll hoof in line and sinker. I recently wrote a series of articles on 
structured FrameMaker, and here's what I put under 'Why should I use structured 
documents?'. The ordering is not significant, and some points have already been 
covered by others:

. A much greater level of automation becomes possible, such as the 
context-dependent application of formatting [mentioned above].

. A document's structure can be validated, that is, checked against the 
structure definition and any errors and omissions flagged.

. Structure allows design devices that would be tedious and error-prone to 
apply in unstructured FrameMaker to be wrapped in elements and used much more 
easily.

. The ability to interact with documents at a structural level makes edits to 
the structure easier and less error-prone, as well as making objects like 
markers much easier to select.

. Formatting rules within the structure definition allow document content to be 
reformatted in response to structural changes, for example changing one element 
into another with a single command and having all child elements reformat 
automatically.

. Meaning can be introduced into document structures. For example, the 
documentation of a software programming interface might include name, interface 
definition, parameter definition list, usage and error messages for each 
procedure call. Such elements can be given descriptive names in the structure 
definition, and completeness can be checked and enforced.

. Locally-applied formatting can be removed by reapplying the structure 
definition to a document.

. Document contents can be repurposed much more easily.

. Extra information about parts of a document can be introduced through the use 
of attributes, data fields that 'belong' to elements but which do not appear in 
the document itself.

. Inter-working with document tagging formats such as SGML and XML becomes 
possible.

I see that I omitted to mention the obvious point that structure allows you to 
separate structure and presentation under two separate systems of control. 

-- 
Steve
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Re: OT: Formatting Readmes with Groff/Latex

[Steve Rickaby]

At 00:43 +1300 15/2/07, rebecca officer wrote:

>Okay, I'll rise to that bait. Nothing like a nice cheerful OT war.

;-)

>I'll concede LaTeX's learning curve, and that its PDF support and font
>management sucks. But it does absolutely gorgeous equations. Easily. And
>it's got no bugs. And its bibliography engine is pretty cool.

OK, I agree. But I've never seen anything come out of LaTeX not created by a 
LaTeX expert that didn't look like an academic paper. If you want all your 
printed material to look like academic papers, or if, of course, you actually 
*write* academic papers, then that's fine. But as far as I can see, if you want 
to bend LaTeX to produce the sort of output that the rest of the world wants, 
you need to devote guru levels of time and application to it. Am I wrong?

>It's not the tool for Neil's job, but if I was writing an equation-rich
>scientific article for print, I'd choose it over FM. And I'm a long way
>from being a power user (I live with one; that helps).

I think you just proved my point ;-)

>Just my opinion, too, of course. ;-)

Yup!

-- 
Steve
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RE: [ADV] Conversion Services for FrameMaker

[Wei Jiang \(PT_ORG\)]

Hello Everyone,

I was just wondering if anyone has used their services and/or products...

Kindest regards,

Wei Jiang
Senior Translator, Project Manager
CATSPAWSOFT Language Solutions, Inc.
Global language services that manage the complexities of
e-Business translation and publishing
Rm. 301, Long Teng Ge,
Long Tan Bei Li 3 Tiao 9 Hao,
Chongwen District, Beijing 100061, China
Phone: +86-10-65565567
Fax: +86-10-65572528
Mobile: +86-13301018190
Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Website: www.catspawsoft.com
 

-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf
Of Claudia
Sent: Saturday, August 12, 2006 12:06 AM
To: framers@FrameUsers.com
Subject: [ADV] Conversion Services for FrameMaker

DOCUMENT CONVERSION SERVICES

Softline International (SII) operates one of the industry's largest document
and data conversion service bureaus. In the past year, SII converted over a
million pages to a variety of formats.

For more information send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] of call 510 849 9817

SII's service bureau has a reputation as being a least-cost provider that
can offer a timely turnaround with 100% accuracy. Here are some of the
formats SII has converted over the last 20 years:

* Conversions to FrameMaker from:

- BookMaster
- Word
- WordPerfect
- Interleaf
- Venture Publisher

* Conversion to SGML (DocBook, IBMIDDoc, EPCS, and Custom DTDs) from:

- BookMaster
- FrameMaker
- Word
- WordPerfect
- Interleaf
- Ventura Publisher
- HTML
- WinHelp

* Conversion to XML (XDocBook, DITA, EPCS, and Custom DTDs) from:

- BookMaster
- FrameMaker
- Word
- WordPerfect
- Interleaf
- Ventura Publisher
- HTML
- WinHelp
- SGML

* BookMaster to InterLeaf

* FrameMaker to HTML

* SGML to HTML (DocBook, IBMIDDoc, EPCS, and Custom DTDs)

WHY USE SII'S SERVICE BUREAU

There are several advantages to using Softline as your document conversion
specialist:

* More cost-effective than doing the conversion in-house.

The true cost of converting a single page of document includes labor,
computing time, training, and licensing fees, as well as the intangible cost
of time for start-up and staff learning curve. Since SII has the expertise
and tools already in place, your cost and time are drastically reduced.

* Faster turnaround time

SII has the staff and infrastructure already in place, so there is only a
minimal setup time involved. Most of our professional staff have over 10
years of document converting and editing experience.
Our service bureau has the capability to convert over ten thousand pages per
day.

* Fixed cost

Once you receive a price quote from SII, the rate is guaranteed.

* Accuracy and schedule are guaranteed

SII has the reputation of delivering accurate documents while honoring your
delivery schedule.

* Technical advice and support

SII has worked with many industry-standard and custom DTDs and we are able
to provide technical advice once you get your documents back.

DITA CONVERSION

There are many companies and tools currently available for DITA conversion.
SII's solution offers the highest quality output with minimum
post-processing. The following list compares SII's solution to those of
other vendors:

* Automated conversion

SII does not employ the ?conversion table? technique used by other vendors.
Our internally developed tools provide a faster and more automated method of
converting files.

* Preserving your naming convention

An important result of conversion is that all of the XML and graphic files
meet your naming conventions. SII offers a number of algorithms for
generating file names or you can specify your own.

* File segmenting

SII can segment your input files into multiple DITA files based on your
requirements.

* Conditional text

SII converts all of your conditional text to the appropriate DITA
attributes. Our software automatically generates one or more DITAVAL files,
which record the original conditional text settings of your input documents.
Condition names are automatically converted to match the DITA standard.

* Automatic DITA Map

Our software uses your FrameMaker book files to generate one or more
(depending on your use of conditional text) DITA Maps, as well as markup to
indicate which headings are to appear in the TOC.

* DITA index markup

Our software can analyze and convert the most complex index markers in
FrameMaker and Word documents. It also automatically relocates any index
markup not allowed in DITA (such as headings).

* Hypertext markup

SII's solution converts hypertext markup to the appropriate DITA tags.
Currently, other vendors would simply drop the markup.

* Lexical analyzer for improved quality.

Based on Softline's grammar checker, the lexical analyzer will scan your
documents to ensure that the markups agree with the actual syntax of the
content. For example:

- Paragraphs that start with words such as, ?Note:?, ?Warning:?, and
?Caution:? are automatically converted to specialized elements.
For example, a paragraph starting with the word 

Re: OT: Formatting Readmes with Groff/Latex

[Bodvar Bjorgvinsson]

Well, actually LaTeX is a set of macros to make writing in TeX easier
(and as such "takes over" TeX), but it is almost entirely made up of
macros to facilitate or make easier the writing of mathematical
documents and other academic papers or books.

I have not worked much in TeX or LaTeX, but it seems to me to be just
as much to learn as in the old digital typesetter software. Me, I had
one of the CompuGraphic PowerView computers with dedicated CRT and/or
film typesetters. This was LONG ago.

Learning TeX or LaTeX makes not much sense to me as long as I have
FrameMaker. But just as FM it handles big files, I have been told. But
it is for free (as in speech and as in beer), so for people with no
money and lots of time it may be worth the while.

The nearest sibling that I am using (privately, of course) is the
music engraving software LilyPond, which I believe is built on or at
least related to Scheme. But then, FrameMaker does not include Music
Engraving options.

If you have some ready made documents in LaTex, then jusst convert
them to pdf and eps and FM takes over from there.

However, in Linux/UNIX/FreeBSD etc, readme files are usually plain
text. Help files are either so-called man files or info files, both of
which are mostly used to give information on and options of how to run
a piece of software, like ls, groff, troff, man, cp, etc. Man files
are just text files set up in a simple format using groff, IIRC, which
is very easy to learn.

The info thing is a bit more complex, as it includes xrefs etc, and I
tend to avoid it as I always forget something about which keys to use
to go here and there.

Bodvar Bjorgvinsson

On 2/14/07, Steve Rickaby <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

At 00:43 +1300 15/2/07, rebecca officer wrote:

>Okay, I'll rise to that bait. Nothing like a nice cheerful OT war.

;-)

>I'll concede LaTeX's learning curve, and that its PDF support and font
>management sucks. But it does absolutely gorgeous equations. Easily. And
>it's got no bugs. And its bibliography engine is pretty cool.

OK, I agree. But I've never seen anything come out of LaTeX not created by a 
LaTeX expert that didn't look like an academic paper. If you want all your 
printed material to look like academic papers, or if, of course, you actually 
*write* academic papers, then that's fine. But as far as I can see, if you want 
to bend LaTeX to produce the sort of output that the rest of the world wants, 
you need to devote guru levels of time and application to it. Am I wrong?

>It's not the tool for Neil's job, but if I was writing an equation-rich
>scientific article for print, I'd choose it over FM. And I'm a long way
>from being a power user (I live with one; that helps).

I think you just proved my point ;-)

>Just my opinion, too, of course. ;-)

Yup!

--
Steve
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Re: Reasons to Structure

[Bodvar Bjorgvinsson]

Matt,

I do both structured and unstructured. The need for that depends IMHO
on the contents and "structure" (or lack of) in the document(s).
However, where I have been using structure (and then I ususally set
all the formatting from within the EDD and avoid using paragraph
format tags), all updating is much easier, and my revisors are much
quicker to make their updates.

This was the short version. Don't have the time for the long version. ;-)

Bodvar

On 2/12/07, MATT TODD <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

All right...tell me good, solid reasons why a company would want to
structure their documents. With my limited knowledge, I know structure
effectively controls styles, fonts, etc...but I could manage that myself
without structure. By extension, I know style control also controls
content location because particular types of writing usually use a
particular style...but I can also manage that myself. I know structure
is designed to encourage single-sourcing, but I'm already headed in that
direction without structure. I'm convinced with time and continuing
documentation analysis, I can parse our documentation so duplicate
verbiage in all our documents imports from one source. I can do that
without structure. I can use conditional text to further cut down
duplicate verbiage; it requires no structure. I can buy scripts or
third-party software to automate documentation procedures without
resorting to structure.

So tell me...why structure documentation? I don't know enough to answer
that question, and neither do my bosses. What's so great about it? What
capabilities does it offer that demand its use? Right now, I'm just
doing what I'm told, but it's always nice to found actions on solid
reason.

Matt

> I'm working with legacy documentation created in Word and FM 7.0
> unstructured. The goal is FM 7.0 structured.

Whose goal is this, and why? I've seen the gee whiz demonstrations from
Adobe reps and been utterly convinced that I Need Structured Docs Now!
only to return to my pdf-output-only client projects that have no real
need for structured Frame. Before committing, make sure there's a
business case for structuring.

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Re: Reasons to Structure

[John Posada]

>>MATT TODD <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>[snip]
>>
>>So tell me...why structure documentation? I don't know enough
>>to answer that question, and neither do my bosses. What's so 
>>great about it?
>>What capabilities does it offer that demand its use? Right now, 
>>I'm just doing what I'm told, but it's always nice to found 
>>actions on solid reason.

1) It's the only way you can manage large amounts of content in a
CMS. Picture having 10,000 pieces of content being shared amoung 20
writers throughout five different writing locations, and you want to
modify one of the pieces. 

Who else is using it? 
Who will it affect?

2) Take that same amount of content. Before you start writing
something from scratch, wouldn't it be nicer (and quicker, and
cheaper) to select a piece already written and drop it into your
document? It's already been reviewed and it's accurate.

3) You receive notification that your product line is now being sold
in another country and it has to be localized. Would it make a
difference in the speed and cost if you knew that 40% of the content
is shared amoung multiple documents and 40% of the content only has
to be localized once rather that four times because it is used in
four documents?

You say nothing about your business, your document volume, nor your
writing process. Are you a single writer at a single location? Don't
do it...it brings nothing to your table that isn't superceded by the
thousands of dollars it will cost you to convert.

OTOH...multiple writers in multiple locations? Maybe.

One of the main criteria? You must be writing according to a defined
process and want to repeat the process over and over, not writing
depending on what you feel like doing at any point in time.

Don't get me wrong...the later description in the above paragraph is
not bad...it's just different than the former.

John Posada
Senior Technical Writer

"I think the problem, to be quite honest with you, is that you've never 
actually known what the question is."
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RE: Reasons to Structure

[Charles Beck]

That makes sense. Thanks. 

-Original Message-
From: Ridder, Fred [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] 
Subject: RE: Reasons to Structure

The point is that you tag a UI element as a UI element because it is a UI 
element. You make it bold (or whatever) at a later point in the process based 
on how you choose to format the semantically tagged elements for a given 
deliverable. The element itself is tagged according to what kind of information 
it is, so the tagging is basically meta-information that has added value to 
your content because it can be used in all sorts of post-processing operations.

Semantic tagging of in-line elements (like names of parameters and API 
functions) is so valuable that our pubs group was doing it in our Word 
documentation many before we transitioned to Frame, which was several years 
before we were acquired by Intel and even more years before Intel sold off that 
business unit and all those documents.

My opinions only; I don't speak for Intel.
Fred Ridder (fred dot ridder at intel dot com) Intel Parsippany, NJ


-Original Message-
Subject: RE: Reasons to Structure

Sorry to be so delinquent in responding to this; I have my excuses.

Some of us actually LIKE the left-brain right-brain gear shifting and are quite 
efficient at it. Mind you, I am a great proponent of structured authoring in 
theory and a miserable practitioner. Maybe it is because I am blessed with a 
mind that is peculiarly both analytical and creative in more-or-less equal 
measure. 

Besides-with the caveat that I have not actually experienced *enforced* 
structured authoring, per sé-if you need to format a word or phrase for 
emphasis or for special recognition (such as bolding UI elements), don't you 
still have to tag that content somewhere? So where is the great advantage? 

As I understand structured authoring (with my admittedly limited 
understanding), its strengths seem to lie more in the realm of freeing the 
author from having to make specific adhoc formatting decisions that may or 
(more likely) may not be consistent. That, and enforcing certain rules about 
what content is required, accepted, optional, etc. 

Is it not so? 

Chuck Beck 
 

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Long URLs

[Stuart Rogers]

Maxwell Hoffmann wrote:


go to the following link:

http://www.translate.com/technology/multilingual_standard/framemaker_plu
g_ins_structure_and_localization.htm

(you may have to edit the line endings in the URL if it is broken into 2
lines by e-mail formatting.) 


May I suggest http://tinyurl.com/ to eliminate problems like this. Just 
copy the long URL, browse to tinyurl.com, paste, and click Make TinyURL. 
The site creates a short URL (http://tinyurl.com/32c8lq in this case) 
that you can then copy and paste elsewhere.


If you use Firefox instead of that loathesome Other Product*, you can 
install an extension or add-on that gives you a menu and a right-click 
option. Each manufactures a tinyURL and copies it to your clipboard in 
one operation, ready to paste into your e-mail message. I use this all 
the time and highly recommend it.





* whose Customization screen says, "Please choose from one of the 
options below." Blech.



--
Stuart Rogers
Technical Communicator
Phoenix Geophysics Limited
Toronto, ON, Canada
+1 (416) 491-7340 x 325

srogers phoenix-geophysics com

"Developers explain How the Product Works.
Technical writers explain How to Work the Product."


Get Firefox!
http://tinyurl.com/8q9c5
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ANN: Call for Speakers: X-Pubs 2007 - Europe's Largest XML conference, June 4-5th

[mark.poston]

Call for Speakers: X-Pubs 2007 - Europe's Largest XML conference, June
4-5th

 

XML content management: does it really get companies the benefits they
are after - at the price promised?  

 

X-Pubs organises and delivers webinars, seminars, case-studies and
whitepapers from some of the industry's most valued technical minds to
educate on and promote the latest content standards. Every year X-Pubs
organises the X-Pubs Conference, Europe's Largest XML Publishing
conference.

 

2007 theme: 

  "How did they do it?"

 

Submission Deadline: 

  Speaker bios/summary (~200 words each) - Feb 20, Full presentation -
May 15

 

Venue: 

   Royal Berkshire Conference Centre, Reading, England (see
http://www.x-pubs.com, "Location" for more)

 

Submission guidelines:

 

This conference will take a look at real customer stories, about
currently rolled out XML solutions, which are starting to evolve their
usage over time.  X-Pubs 2006 showed us that the world is ready to start
going beyond explanation of new XML technologies and benefits, and start
discussing how to run a successful XML implementation, and drill into
the detail that leads an implementation to delivering those benefits and
their return on investment.  

 

In light of this, X-Pubs 2007 presentation proposals must be:

   *  Be focussed on either the technical or business aspects of an
*actual* implementation 

   *  Customer examples / case studies should be presented by, or
jointly with, the end-solution client themselves, not just by the vendor

 

We also welcome: 

   *  Educational, conceptual or "thought-leading" oriented
presentations, i.e., not a commercial sales pitch 

   *  We still strongly encourage that conceptual or thought-leading
presentations be delivered as much as possible in the context of, and
with specific references to, a specific project involving XML (DITA, of
course, and SGML if it's really an interesting one).  Actual clients
need not be co-presenting in this instance.

 

Contact: http://www.x-pubs.com / [EMAIL PROTECTED] 

+44(0)208 722 8400 / From North America 011 44 208 722 8400

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Re: Reasons to Structure

[Maxwell Hoffmann]

Matt,

Another major benefit of structured FrameMaker is "context sensitive
formatting," which I believe was mentioned before by another forum
member. An added detail is that you can reuse "generic" element tags
which will look dramatically different in different contexts.

In unstructured FrameMaker, it is not uncommon to use 3 paragraph tags
for a 3-level nested list: [bulletlist] "contains" [dashlist] which
"contains" [sqbulletlist]. In structured FrameMaker you could use a
generic element [list] and have format rules in the EDD determine that a
"second level" list contained within a list would be tagged with
paragraph [dashlist] while a "third level" list contained within a list
contained within a list would be tagged with paragraph [sqbulletlist].
In the structured editor, if you were to select a 3rd level nested
[list] element and dynamically drag it to the 2nd level, it will
automatically reformat and be tagged with [dashlist] instead of
[sqbulletlist].

The key benefit is that users have fewer tags to deal with. In an actual
customer example, we had a client who was using over 130 paragraph tags
(including paragraph variants like [BulletListLast], [DashListLast],
[WhateveListLast].) In most of these cases, such paragraphs were
identical to normal list paragraphs, but had extra space below paragraph
to ensure that the last item in the list did not "slam" into the next
paragraph. We developed a structured FrameMaker application for this
client with format rules in the EDD which ensured that the last
[ListItem] element contained in a [List] element has extra space below
it. As a result, our client moved from using over 130 PARAGRAPH tags to
about 40 frequently used ELEMENT tags. Our client observed that it
became easier for new staff to master rather complex document template
rules. NOTE: this client had about 5 tech writers working on very high
volume documentation with consistent formatting and structure. Average
FrameMaker books were about 400pp long.

Another benefit from the transition to structure was that the tech
writers produced more consistent document structure. Due to the lack of
random character level format overrides, there was less "touch up" to
formatting in post-translation documents, which reduced billable time on
translation projects. Format proofing time was greatly reduced, which
was magnified by the 11 languages XML extracted from FrameMaker was
translated into.

Structured FrameMaker *does* require a lot of work up front,
establishing the EDD if you have complex formatting, but it is well
worth the effort and you will gain a return on investment fairly
quickly. I hope that this helps.


>MATT TODD <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>[snip]
>
>So tell me...why structure documentation? I don't know enough to
answer
>that question, and neither do my bosses. What's so great about it?
What
>capabilities does it offer that demand its use? Right now, I'm just
>doing what I'm told, but it's always nice to found actions on solid
>reason.
>
>Matt


Maxwell Hoffmann
Manager of Consulting & Training Solutions
ENLASO Corporation
T: 805 494 9571 * F: 805 435 1920
E: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
ENLASO Corporation provides quality enterprise language solutions and
exceeds client expectations through continuing research, development,
and implementation of effective localization processes and technologies.

Visit: www.translate.com for more information or to subscribe to our
complimentary localization newsletter. 

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RE: Vista and font cache

[Dov Isaacs]

Rebecca,
 
We honestly don't know what is causing the problem other than that
deleting
the Windows font cache clears the symptoms at least for a while (where
for
some "a while" is longer than for others). The problem seems to be
shared
by Windows 2000 and XP (which share a tremendous amount of code). 
We did not see it with Windows'9x or Windows NT 4, both of which have 
significantly different text/font handling mechanisms than Windows 2000
and XP. I haven't heard of anyone encountering the problem with Vista,
but that doesn't mean that it is exempt either since the GDI-based text
and font handling is based on that of Windows XP.
 
My observation is that if you indeed encounter the problem even once on
a 
particular system, you should assume that you are likely to encounter it
again
on that system and as such, you should proactively delete the font cache
and
reboot on a regular basis. What is a regular basis? Your guess is as
good as
mine. Of those who have "fixed" the problem by doing the font cache
deletion 
and reboot, I haven't heard of anyone getting the problem back that
quickly
(i.e., within hours or days or even a week). If I was to start seeing
the symptom
occur on my system, I would configure my system to have a system
shutdown
script that would delete the font cache every time the system shutdown
(which
is part of every reboot). Since reboots occur most times you do a
Microsoft
Windows Update (for example, yesterday was "Patch Tuesday"), you would
probably get a clean font cache at least once a month if not more
frequently.
If you shutdown the computer once a day, then you get a clean font cache
daily.
 
What is the cost of having a new font cache? As far as I can determine,
not
much. I have yet to see any performance hit when deleting a font cache
and rebooting other than the time to delete the font cache and reboot.
 
With regards to any "fixes" -- the problem is not readily reproducible
and
as such we can't instrument FrameMaker to look for where we can change
any code to prevent the problem. My comments about old GDI calls is
guesswork on my part based on a few hunches, the technical details of
which I will not bore this list with.
 
- Dov
 
 


From: rebecca officer [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] 
Sent: Tuesday, February 13, 2007 6:38 PM
To: Dov Isaacs
Cc: Framers (E-mail); FrameMaker Discussion Forum
Subject: RE: Vista and font cache



Hi Dov

Are you saying that deleting the font cache and rebooting should
get
rid of the symptoms for a while, regardless of the size of the
font
cache after reboot?

My memory of last year's posts was that you had to also reduce
the size
of the font cache by deleting big unused fonts. I did that a few
months
ago and my font cache is now around 770 KB. But a document
showed the
symptoms again a couple of days ago. Is that what you'd expect?

Next time I have a document with symptoms, I'll try just
deleting the
cache and rebooting.

Also, does your email mean that Adobe are hunting for those "old
Windows GDI calls made by FrameMaker" to fix the bug?

Thanks, Rebecca

>>> "Dov Isaacs" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 14/02/07 10:42 >>>
The symptom was reported against FrameMaker internally.
The problem has been seen in printing to PostScript
printers and as such, cannot be traced in any way to
Distiller (or the AdobePDF PostScript printer driver
instance). The symptom is not directly reproducible;
all we know is that by deleting the FNTCACHE.DAT file
and rebooting, the problem goes away, at least for a
while. Since FrameMaker does not and cannot directly
access or manipulate the FNTCACHE.DAT file, the likely
cause of the bug are old Windows GDI calls made by
FrameMaker that are still supported by Windows, but
in which some bug associated with font caching crept
in over the years.

- Dov


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Re: Reasons to Structure

[Peter Gold]

Maxwell Hoffmann wrote:

Matt,

Another major benefit of structured FrameMaker is "context sensitive
formatting," which I believe was mentioned before by another forum
member. An added detail is that you can reuse "generic" element tags
which will look dramatically different in different contexts.

  

Hi, Matt:

Maxwell's point and example about how useful context-sensitive 
formatting rules can be is right on. However, this ability to interpret 
the rules you create in your EDD, blurs the line between several aspects 
of structured FrameMaker. Structured element design is required so the 
rules know each element's "identity," or definition. The rules can't 
function without clear instructions and clear identification of each 
element.


It's something like you can't have a terrific automatic 
zillion-position-adjustable-programmable-memory car seat without having 
the car, the power to run the seat, and having spent the time learning 
to adjust the seat, to capture the settings for each user, and how to 
recall each user's setting.


Context-sensitive formatting is terrific! No doubt about it. But, you 
get the most return on your learning investment by having documents that 
often require the kind of manual effort that's worth turning over to the 
smart rules-inforcer, to gain efficiency.


HTH

Regards,

Peter Gold
KnowHow ProServices
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Trouble with cross-references

[pearlrosenberg]

Hi Framers,

FrameMaker 7.p576
Windows XP Professional

I have a book with 17 chapters. Every time I open the chapters in it, 
for six of the chapters I get a message that there are unresolved 
cross-references. There are six other chapters with cross-references 
that do not generate this message.

Each time, I search for the unresolved cross-references (every cross-
reference in each of these chapters), double-click on each, replace it 
with the one in the cross-reference dialog box, and save the file. 
Then I save all the files in the book and save and close the book. The 
next time I open the book, the same cross-references are unresolved 
again.

I created this book from an earlier version by copying the files from 
the old directory to a new one. Then I opened FrameMaker, created a 
new book, and added the files to the new book.

Any suggestions on how I can fix this? BTW, when the cross-references 
are unresolved, they correctly identify the heads, chapters, page 
numbers, and so forth.
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Re: Trouble with cross-references

[Art Campbell]

Have you tried "washing" the chapters by saving as .mif files,
reopening them, and saving as .fm?

Art

On 2/14/07, [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

Hi Framers,

FrameMaker 7.p576
Windows XP Professional

I have a book with 17 chapters. Every time I open the chapters in it,
for six of the chapters I get a message that there are unresolved
cross-references. There are six other chapters with cross-references
that do not generate this message.

Each time, I search for the unresolved cross-references (every cross-
reference in each of these chapters), double-click on each, replace it
with the one in the cross-reference dialog box, and save the file.
Then I save all the files in the book and save and close the book. The
next time I open the book, the same cross-references are unresolved
again.

I created this book from an earlier version by copying the files from
the old directory to a new one. Then I opened FrameMaker, created a
new book, and added the files to the new book.

Any suggestions on how I can fix this? BTW, when the cross-references
are unresolved, they correctly identify the heads, chapters, page
numbers, and so forth.
___


--
Art Campbell [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 "... In my opinion, there's nothing in this world beats a '52 Vincent
  and a redheaded girl." -- Richard Thompson
No disclaimers apply.
DoD 358
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RE: Trouble with cross-references

[Combs, Richard]

[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: 
 
> I have a book with 17 chapters. Every time I open the 
> chapters in it, for six of the chapters I get a message that 
> there are unresolved cross-references. There are six other 
> chapters with cross-references that do not generate this message.
> 
> Each time, I search for the unresolved cross-references 
> (every cross- reference in each of these chapters), 
> double-click on each, replace it with the one in the 
> cross-reference dialog box, and save the file. 
> Then I save all the files in the book and save and close the 
> book. The next time I open the book, the same 
> cross-references are unresolved again.

It's possible that the problem lies with the destination files, not the
files containing the xrefs. 
To check or update an xref, FM must "silently" (in the background,
without you noticing) open the file that the xref points to. If that
file has a problem like a missing font or graphic, FM can't open the
file silently, so it can't check the xref's destination ("resolve" it).
Once you open the file, responding to the dialog about missing fonts or
whatever, the xref is no longer unresolved. 

Try this: From the book file, hold down the Shift key and click File >
Open All Files in Book. If I'm on the right track, you'll be prompted
about missing fonts or something before some of the files open. Once
they're all open, a search for unresolved xrefs won't find any. 

HTH!
Richard


--
Richard G. Combs
Senior Technical Writer
Polycom, Inc.
richardDOTcombs AT polycomDOTcom
303-223-5111
--
rgcombs AT gmailDOTcom
303-777-0436
--




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RE: Reasons to Structure

[Daniel Emory]

No one has mentioned the potential for greatly
improving writer productivity, as well as eliminating
format overrides. 

Once authors are up to speed on using the structure
view and the element catalog, they're freed from the
entire formatting burden (if the EDD specifies
context-based format rules). I see no reason why this
productivity advantage would diminish for relatively
small documents.

And, unlike unstructured Frame, re-importing the EDD
into a structured document with "Remove Format
Overrides" turned on will eliminate every single
instance in which authors overrode the EDD-specified
formatting. When authors realize this step is part of
the review process, they know the jig is up.
-


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RE: Reasons to Structure

[Daniel Emory]

--- Charles Beck <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Besides-with the caveat that I have not actually
> experienced *enforced* structured authoring, per
> sé-if you need to format a word or phrase for
> emphasis or for special recognition (such as bolding
> UI elements), don't you still have to tag that
> content somewhere? So where is the great advantage?
===
Semantic tagging of a word or phrase can be
implemented by wrapping it with an EDD-defined
text-range element whose element name describes the
semantic type. A format rule in the EDD automatically
applies the correct format to it.  

> As I understand structured authoring (with my
> admittedly limited understanding), its strengths
> seem to lie more in the realm of freeing the author
> from having to make specific adhoc formatting
> decisions that may or (more likely) may not be
> consistent. That, and enforcing certain rules about
> what content is required, accepted, optional, etc.
===
In a properly designed EDD, there is no such thing as
ad-hoc formatting. That is, Format rules define all
formatting. These format rules can be based on one or
more of the following: element name, element context,
element attribute value(s), and format change lists
referenced from within the format rules. Typically,
full use of these capabilities can drastically reduce
the number of paragraph and character formats required
in a FrameMaker template. I could go on to describe
numerous other advantages of this approach to
formatting.

Typically, full use of  

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Re: RE: Trouble with cross-references

[pearlrosenberg]

Richard,
I think this is on the right track. When I open the files, every one 
displays a msg saying the file uses unavailable fonts and that 
clicking OK will reformat the file with available fonts. I've click OK 
for every file numerous times and the files open and before I close 
them, I save them, but the next time I open them, I get the same 
messages.
How could I have created the files with unavailable fonts? And more 
importantly, how do I fix this? This is particulary important bec I 
anticipate many updates to this manual and this iteration will be the 
basis for the next.
Thanks in advance for your help.
Pearl

- Original Message -
From: "Combs, Richard" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: Wednesday, February 14, 2007 4:38 pm
Subject: RE: Trouble with cross-references
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED], framers@frameUsers.com

> [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: 
> 
> > I have a book with 17 chapters. Every time I open the 
> > chapters in it, for six of the chapters I get a message that 
> > there are unresolved cross-references. There are six other 
> > chapters with cross-references that do not generate this message.
> > 
> > Each time, I search for the unresolved cross-references 
> > (every cross- reference in each of these chapters), 
> > double-click on each, replace it with the one in the 
> > cross-reference dialog box, and save the file. 
> > Then I save all the files in the book and save and close the 
> > book. The next time I open the book, the same 
> > cross-references are unresolved again.
> 
> It's possible that the problem lies with the destination files, 
> not the
> files containing the xrefs. 
> To check or update an xref, FM must "silently" (in the background,
> without you noticing) open the file that the xref points to. If that
> file has a problem like a missing font or graphic, FM can't open the
> file silently, so it can't check the xref's destination ("resolve" 
> it).Once you open the file, responding to the dialog about missing 
> fonts or
> whatever, the xref is no longer unresolved. 
> 
> Try this: From the book file, hold down the Shift key and click 
> File >
> Open All Files in Book. If I'm on the right track, you'll be prompted
> about missing fonts or something before some of the files open. Once
> they're all open, a search for unresolved xrefs won't find any. 
> 
> HTH!
> Richard
> 
> 
> --
> Richard G. Combs
> Senior Technical Writer
> Polycom, Inc.
> richardDOTcombs AT polycomDOTcom
> 303-223-5111
> --
> rgcombs AT gmailDOTcom
> 303-777-0436
> --
> 
> 
> 
> 
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Re: Trouble with cross-references

[pearlrosenberg]

Thanks, Art. I tried this. I converted the fm files to mif, converted 
the mif files to fm, and then cleaned up all the x-refs and saved the 
files. Unfortunately, when I opened the book again, the x-refs were ng.

- Original Message -
From: Art Campbell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: Wednesday, February 14, 2007 4:24 pm
Subject: Re: Trouble with cross-references
To: "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Cc: framers@frameusers.com

> Have you tried "washing" the chapters by saving as .mif files,
> reopening them, and saving as .fm?
> 
> Art
> 
> On 2/14/07, [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 
wrote:
> > Hi Framers,
> >
> > FrameMaker 7.p576
> > Windows XP Professional
> >
> > I have a book with 17 chapters. Every time I open the chapters 
> in it,
> > for six of the chapters I get a message that there are unresolved
> > cross-references. There are six other chapters with cross-
references
> > that do not generate this message.
> >
> > Each time, I search for the unresolved cross-references (every 
> cross-
> > reference in each of these chapters), double-click on each, 
> replace it
> > with the one in the cross-reference dialog box, and save the file.
> > Then I save all the files in the book and save and close the 
> book. The
> > next time I open the book, the same cross-references are unresolved
> > again.
> >
> > I created this book from an earlier version by copying the files 
> from> the old directory to a new one. Then I opened FrameMaker, 
> created a
> > new book, and added the files to the new book.
> >
> > Any suggestions on how I can fix this? BTW, when the cross-
> references> are unresolved, they correctly identify the heads, 
> chapters, page
> > numbers, and so forth.
> > ___
> 
> -- 
> Art Campbell 
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]  "... In my opinion, there's nothing in 
> this world beats a '52 Vincent
>   and a redheaded girl." -- Richard Thompson
> No disclaimers apply.
> DoD 358
> 
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RE: RE: Trouble with cross-references

[Combs, Richard]

[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 
> Richard,
> I think this is on the right track. When I open the files, 
> every one displays a msg saying the file uses unavailable 
> fonts and that clicking OK will reformat the file with 
> available fonts. I've click OK for every file numerous times 
> and the files open and before I close them, I save them, but 
> the next time I open them, I get the same messages.

If you're happy with the available fonts, do this get rid of the
unavailable ones for good: 

1) With all the files in your book closed, select File > Preferences. In
the dialog, uncheck Remember Missing Font Names and click Set. 

2) Open all the files in your book. You'll get the unavailable fonts
message one more time for each. Confirm that you want to replace the
unavailable fonts. 

3) Save all the files in your book and close them. 

4) Open the files again. They should open without any unavailable fonts
messages. 

HTH!
Richard


--
Richard G. Combs
Senior Technical Writer
Polycom, Inc.
richardDOTcombs AT polycomDOTcom
303-223-5111
--
rgcombs AT gmailDOTcom
303-777-0436
--






  
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Re: RE: Trouble with cross-references

[John Posada]

> How could I have created the files with unavailable fonts? And more
> importantly, how do I fix this? This is particulary important bec I
> anticipate many updates to this manual and this iteration will be
> the 
> basis for the next.
> Thanks in advance for your help.
> Pearl

You probably didn't. However, you might have brought in other content
that did. You might be using EPS and they include their own fonts. 

Change your setting for:

File -> Prefernces -> General -> Remember Missing Font Names

John Posada
Senior Technical Writer

"I think the problem, to be quite honest with you, is that you've never 
actually known what the question is."
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RE: RE: Trouble with cross-references

[Ridder, Fred]

But after you're done clearing the missing font references,
do return to File>Preferences and turn the remember Missing
Fonts item back on because it is normally a good thing.
This is particularly true if you ever work on files that 
originated someplace else (e.g. a client) and that will be 
returned after you work on them. If you have the "Remember..."
option turned off, you may be returning files that use very
different fonts than they did when you received them--not a
nice thing to do to a client's files.

My opinions only; I don't speak for Intel.
Fred Ridder (fred dot ridder at intel dot com)
Intel
Parsippany, NJ


-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Combs, Richard
Sent: Wednesday, February 14, 2007 5:37 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: framers@frameUsers.com
Subject: RE: RE: Trouble with cross-references

[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 
> Richard,
> I think this is on the right track. When I open the files, 
> every one displays a msg saying the file uses unavailable 
> fonts and that clicking OK will reformat the file with 
> available fonts. I've click OK for every file numerous times 
> and the files open and before I close them, I save them, but 
> the next time I open them, I get the same messages.

If you're happy with the available fonts, do this get rid of the
unavailable ones for good: 

1) With all the files in your book closed, select File > Preferences. In
the dialog, uncheck Remember Missing Font Names and click Set. 

2) Open all the files in your book. You'll get the unavailable fonts
message one more time for each. Confirm that you want to replace the
unavailable fonts. 

3) Save all the files in your book and close them. 

4) Open the files again. They should open without any unavailable fonts
messages. 

HTH!
Richard
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RE: Trouble with cross-references

[White, William]

Hi Framers
I encountered something that sounds very similar to this. I inherited a
years-old project with multiple chapters that had undergone a number of
revisions. Every time I attempted to generate a PDF of the entire Book
the beast would die on me about 3/4 of the way through. 

It turns out that my villainous predecessors were in the habit of
renaming the files at every revision to keep track of the versioning and
the chapter order. (They appear to have never discovered the function of
the Display Heading Text/Show Filename toggle in the Book view - a
surprisingly common bit of ignorance among tyro Framers - so they didn't
know how to tell if the chapters were in the desired order without
hacking the filename to include some indication of the chapter number
AND revision number.) Consequently there were legacy X-refs to headings
in chapters that were still in the book, but which contained the old
filename in their XRef definitions. I presume this happened because my
predecessors didn't use the Rename File function in the book view, but
probably renamed the files outside FM. 

I tried the flush-through-MIF routine which did not solve the problem
since the legacy X-refs were still there. By chance during one of the
failed PDF generation attempts I got a glimpse of the offending legacy
file name, and was able to track the offending X-ref down in the MIF
where I found that the  tag contained an ancient file name.
As soon as I deleted that one single nasty  tag from the MIF
everything worked happily from then on out. 

It would seem to be a doable task for some script-happy person to write
a tool that would parse through a book's MIFs and delete all the 
tags that contain out-of-date file names. (Obviously the user would have
to supply a listing of legitimate current file names.) I'm a bit
surprised that FM didn't handle some of this cleanup by itself, but
these were SERIOUSLY abused documents so I can't fault the software.

Hope this helps.

Will White

-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Wednesday, February 14, 2007 1:06 PM
To: framers@frameUsers.com
Subject: Trouble with cross-references

Hi Framers,

FrameMaker 7.p576
Windows XP Professional

I have a book with 17 chapters. Every time I open the chapters in it,
for six of the chapters I get a message that there are unresolved
cross-references. There are six other chapters with cross-references
that do not generate this message.

Each time, I search for the unresolved cross-references (every cross-
reference in each of these chapters), double-click on each, replace it
with the one in the cross-reference dialog box, and save the file. 
Then I save all the files in the book and save and close the book. The
next time I open the book, the same cross-references are unresolved
again.

I created this book from an earlier version by copying the files from
the old directory to a new one. Then I opened FrameMaker, created a new
book, and added the files to the new book.

Any suggestions on how I can fix this? BTW, when the cross-references
are unresolved, they correctly identify the heads, chapters, page
numbers, and so forth.
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Re: Reasons to Structure

[Jeremy H. Griffith]

On Wed, 14 Feb 2007 04:56:49 -0700, [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
wrote:

>Jeremy Griffith wrote [referring to semantic markup]:
>
>>You can do the same with paragraph formats, too.  But you can
>>do all that in UNstructured docs just as easily as in structured.
>>Maybe *more* easily, when you factor in the time to set up your
>>structure, and to modify it when you make changes, which is major.  
>>
>>I've only been able to identify one situation in which structured 
>>Frame can do this better than unstructured, and that's when you'd 
>>want nested element tags within a paragraph, since you cam't nest 
>>character formats.  (There are easy workarounds for creating the 
>>equivalent of nested paragraph formats, such as using start/end 
>>formats and/or markers.)  OTOH, I have yet to see a non-hypothetical 
>>case where such nested char formats were really needed...
>>
>>Structured Frame is designed for large pubs groups where standard
>>document designs are required, perhaps for ISO 9000, perhaps for
>>other corporate policy reasons.  For smaller groups, and especially
>>for lone writers, the setup costs (time and consultants) are likely
>>to exceed the benefits, much like a CMS (Content Management System)
>>can.  There are excellent consultants around, many on this list,
>>for whom it is a breeze.  If you decide to go this way, hire one.
>>It will prevent much anguish and hair loss.

>This is misinformation, on nearly all counts. 

Isn't that a tad harsh, Russ?  My point, which you appear to have 
missed, is that (as Richard said) semantic markup is good, *and*
that you can do it in unstructured Frame.  Do you deny this fact?

I also said that for small groups, "the setup costs (time and 
consultants) are likely to exceed the benefits".  I'll stand by
that assessment, based on using Frame in both its unstructured 
*and* structured (formerly known as "FrameBuilder") forms over
many, many years, originally on a Sun 2...  I didn't say there
are *no* benefits, just that the costs may be greater.  Do you
assert that the costs are always insignificant, then?

>I am a lone writer who is completely dependent on structured Frame. 
>Without it, I would need at least twice the manpower to handle the 
>busywork that it does. Furthermore, I adhere to no industry standard 
>and make changes to my structured template frequently. 

All well and good... but what *else* are you?  An expert in
structure, perhaps?  How long have you worked with structure?
As I said, "There are excellent consultants around, many on 
this list, for whom it is a breeze."  You are one of the four 
or five I'd think of first...  Here's the first line on your
home page: "Welcome to West Street Consulting, your home for 
structured FrameMaker® plugins and other utilities."  I've
also written plugins that work with structured Frame (Mif2Go
does, just fine), but I hardly consider myself a representative
Frame user... nor would I assume that everyone would have as
easy a time as I do.  Do you say it's easy for everyone?

>Granted, the setup costs for me are minimal now, because I 
>have the skill set.  

My point exactly.  That's why I said "hire a consultant".
Do you think consultants are unnecessary?  

>But that is the whole point of these occasional rants... you 
>just have to get in there and learn, because that's when it 
>becomes a breeze. 

Assuming, that is, that you *have* the time.  Many of our
colleagues, having survived downsizing from ten writers to
two with no decrease of workload, do not.  And if you do,
is that time better spent on learning nifty new tools, or
on improving the docs you're paid to write?  One size does
*not* fit all.  If you have a genuine *business* case for
going to structured Frame (or if you are a hacker at heart, 
like you and I), go for it.  ;-)

>Of course it takes time to ramp up, but when it is so 
>obviously the way of the future, ...

This makes me feel old.Well, I *am* old... old
enough to remember any number of "obvious" advances that
went nowhere.  The future has many ways... most of which
we won't recognize until we get there.  Here's a little
related snippet from [XML-DEV] today:

> [Michael Chanpion:] On the other hand, this is more or less 
> the story of CORBA – lots of time and money spent on something 
> that has vastly underperformed relative to its initial hype.

> [Elliotte Rusty Harold:] Exactly, and that's hardly the only 
> example of lots of corporate money being fed into the shredder.

That's in the current "More predictions to mull over" thread...

>Two final points...
>
>- I'll retract much of what I said if you can provide a single 
>recent example of anything groundbreaking in the area of techcomm 
>that specifically involved unstructured content.

The Web?  You don't consider HTML an example of structured
content, do you?  It qualifies in only the most technical 
sense... and most pages violate even its simple DTDs grossly.
Or maybe it's not recent enough for you?

>- Always beware of the type

color change in pdf file

[Surbhi Singhal]

Hi Framers
I seem to be stuck in a strange problem.
I have defined Navy color in Frame : "Process", "100, 100, 42, 0"

when i create the pdf with windows based framemaker 7.1 : things work fine
when i create the pdf with solaris based framemaker 7.1: the color
definition seems to have changed. It appears very dark.

what could be the reason. Its happening for all the files and not just one
peculiar fm file.

Any pointers are appreciated. Thanx a lot for your help.

Regards
Surbhi
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Introducing Technical Writing, Tools, and Process to Teams in the Company

[Roopa Belur]

Hello Framers,
   
  The Publications team in our company is planning on a company-wide spree to 
introduce (in some cases, re-introduce) ourselves, and briefly enlighten the 
key groups in our company on:

  - What is Publications
- Why we document
  - How we document 
  - Who is our audience
   
  As I am leading the effort for this promotion, I need your help in:
   
  - Have you all done anything similar
  - If yes, how often do you give presentations
  - What do you cover
  - What is the best way to introduce Tools/processes 
   
  I want to start the session with an interactive technical writing task, so 
people have context to the PPT presentation. What are some of the good 
exercises to target for a mixed audience of developers, Support, Operations, 
and product managers?
   
  Any ideas/suggestions/comments/websites will help. 
  
Rgds,
Roopa Belur
   
  

 


  
"We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give."
Sir Winston Churchill


  





 
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