TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
Re: Structured FM vs Arbortext Editor--Compare to FM with WebWorks ePublisher?
Subject:Re: Structured FM vs Arbortext Editor--Compare to FM with WebWorks ePublisher? From:Ruth Sessions <ruthsessions03051 -at- yahoo -dot- com> To:"Brian -dot- Henderson -at- mitchell1 -dot- com" <Brian -dot- Henderson -at- mitchell1 -dot- com>, "techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com> Date:Thu, 27 Oct 2011 14:25:49 -0700 (PDT)
Question for Structured FrameMaker and Arbortext users:
How do these structured/non-WYSIWYG products compare to using WYSIWYG FrameMaker with WebWorks ePublisher?
Has anyone tried the new ePublisher? I saw a demo of it a few months ago and I think it looks like a great tool for
generating PDF, HTML, and WebPage output from single-source FrameMaker files. It does not require you use
structured FrameMaker. It lets you differentiate between what you will show in each format--somewhat like a
master conditional text overlay. I believe it let you set up DITA tags to help you differentiate when content is included.
Overall, it sounds like a productivity winner. But I only saw the demo...
Has anyone actually used it who can give the list a technical communicator's professional opinion of it?
________________________________
From: "Brian -dot- Henderson -at- mitchell1 -dot- com" <Brian -dot- Henderson -at- mitchell1 -dot- com>
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Sent: Tuesday, August 16, 2011 4:52 PM
Subject: RE: Structured FM versus Arbortext Editor
I'd have to agree with Gene here. In this type of environment what you'd
want to see most of the time is the raw structure. But...WYSIWYG can be
useful for checking that your structure is correct. A visual
interpretation can point out flaws.
I went through that today. I often work with an ancient version of
Arbortext (Adept v.7 1998). I'm halfway through a weeks-long updating of
many files, and today I thought I'd go ahead convert them all to PDF
just to see what I've missed. Sure enough, I had to make minor
corrections to a third of the files I'd already "finished". If Adept had
a WYSIWYG function I wouldn't have had to go through the (in my case)
very cumbersome PDF process.
BTW, I really hope the newest version of the Arbortext editor is greatly
improved from the one I use. I don't care for it at all.
-Brian H.
-----Original Message----- From: Gene Kim-Eng
After you work in structured for a while you'll probably come to see the
WYSIWYG display as a waste of screen space that could be showing you
more tree levels instead. It's not as if you're going to be manually
formatting structured documents. Or at least you shouldn't be if your
structure is well-formed.
Create and publish documentation through multiple channels with Doc-To-Help.
Choose your authoring formats and get any output you may need. Try
Doc-To-Help, now with MS SharePoint integration, free for 30-days. http://www.doctohelp.com
---
You are currently subscribed to TECHWR-L as ruthsessions03051 -at- yahoo -dot- com -dot-
Create and publish documentation through multiple channels with Doc-To-Help.
Choose your authoring formats and get any output you may need. Try
Doc-To-Help, now with MS SharePoint integration, free for 30-days. http://www.doctohelp.com
---
You are currently subscribed to TECHWR-L as archive -at- web -dot- techwr-l -dot- com -dot-
