Re: Moving away from MS Word?

["Char James-Tanny" <charjtf -at- gmail -dot- com>]

> o AuthorIT -- I have never used this tool. Having just returned from the WritersUA Conference in Long Beach, I can tell you that many people complained about how expensive it is and how difficult it is to get tech support. It seems that AuthorIT was developed in Austraila (I hope I am remembering this correctly) and the time difference between the two countries made getting answers NOT timely.

Just FYI...AuthorIT is in the same price range as the other HATs (an
Enterprise license is $899; Workgroup and Desktop are cheaper;
floating licenses are more expensive). Tech support is provided by
local resellers and the AIT User's Group (plus other groups, like
TechWhirl), in addition to the main company, which is located in New
Zealand. They promise answers within 24 hours, and I've heard of very
few complaints in getting responses.

> o Framemaker --  The first version of Frame that I used was Framemaker 1.2X (thats the X-Windows System on UNIX) back in 1990. Framemaker is a bit long in the tooth (as am I) and it is not perfect. It is less perfect since Adobe took it over. Again, you won't get good support from Adobe but the Framers user group is very supportive.

Frame 8 will be going into beta within the next several months. (I
don't know if that makes a difference or not, because I don't use
Frame.)

> o Madcap's Blaze -- I have just migrated to Madcap's Flare 2.5 which translates Framemaker files to HTML files. It's my replacement for WWP which I won't bother you with. I have not used Blaze which is Madcap's replacement for Frame. The tool is brand new and thus probably buggy. I have volunteered to be a beta-site tester but have not actually gotten my hands on the program yet. Proceed with caution.

There's been lots of good buzz about Flare...I've heard about some
issues, many of which have been addressed IIRC. Flare lets folks
import Frame files into its environment (thus using Flare for ongoing
development) or reference Frame files (thus using Frame for ongoing
development).

Char James-Tanny ~ JTF Associates, Inc. ~ http://www.helpstuff.com
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