FrameMaker and conditional text

[cll01821 -at- lycos -dot- com]

Just curious ... did you consider generating two separate guides?

I'm currently generating 11 "separate" install guides from one set of source files. I create a book file for each platform-specific guide. Each book file contains the appropriate chapters for the platform; for example, some of the books use "Installing the TWAIN driver" while others use "Installing the JAR file".

Some chapters, such as "Installing the software" contain a combination of common and unique text; I apply conditional tags as needed to the platform-specific text or images. For example, step 6 might document how to license a device. The step contains all the information for licensing devices for all platforms, but I've applied a conditional tag to each bit of platform-specific information.

In addition, I do violate one of the "rules" of conditional text by applying conditional tags within a sentence. For example, if a sentence relates to platform x and platform y, I might writing On platformxplatformy, do this, with appropriate tags applied to "platformx" and "platformy". (I try to avoid doing this as much as possible because it makes localisation a wee bit more complex.)

Carol

 

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