Re: Decoupling editing and printing

[Tom Murrell <tmurrell -at- COLUMBUS -dot- RR -dot- COM>]

Sandy Harris (mailto:sharris -at- DKL -dot- COM) wrote, in part:

<SNIP>
> On one job, we had some large Frame docs, maybe 10 of them at a few 100
> pages each, and some writers had used a lot of hard page breaks to fit
> things on our corporate standard pages. Then the product was sold to
> a customer who wanted all our manuals printed on their corporate
> standard size. There was a lot of busywork that needed doing before
> they got what they needed.
>
> Methinks the computer should do the busywork. An operation like that
> should require changing style sheets, perhaps creating the new one,
> and printing. Period. If it needs manual intervention or custom
> scripts, something is broken.
>
I would think you could apply a new template to the documentation in
question, one that fit the client's corporate standards.  I'll grant you
that it is probably a bit of work to both design the new template (I'm
guessing here that the client doesn't use Frame and doesn't have a Frame
template you could "borrow" for this exercise.) and get the new template
tested and working properly.  That probably qualifies as busy work.

Yes, the computer should do the busy work; that's what they do best.  But,
back in the days when I was still a development programmer we had a saying,
"There is no magic in the world; some poor SOB has to code the darn thing."
The getting of the template, which here qualifies as the stylesheet to which
you were referring, ready for this conversion does involve a lot of minutia,
but that is less busy work than it is programming necessary to the task.

If you've not created the necessary master pages and reference pages before,
creating them the first time is not a trivial exercise, but it is a
necessary one, and it's one that I think would fall within the purview of a
competent Technical Writer.

<MORE QUOTING>
> Overstating slightly for the sake of argument:
>
>   If your print formatting program cannot format a document properly
>     on various page sizes without hard page breaks, it is broken.
>
>   If your editor allows writers to insert hard page breaks, that is
>     a bug.

Okay, I'll argue.  First, what is the definition of "format a document
properly?"  You are asking for a computer program to read your mind, I
think.  That seems unrealistic.  I don't see where putting in hard page
breaks is unrealistic.  Anytime you move from one stylesheet or template to
another, a reasonable person would expect to have to read through and
correct formatting decisions that didn't translate well or work well with
the new format.

And, personally, I'm grateful that my "editor" (a word I don't think I would
even apply to MS Word much less FrameMaker) allows me that latitude  It's
easier than some other kinds of juggling that might be done.

Given that different size paper is effectively a different medium, I think
your wish is unreasonable.

<MORE QUOTING>
> If I quote a piece of your text, there are things I can change without
> risking you claiming you've been misquoted: line breaks, page breaks,
> font, ... Other things, like wording, punctuation and emphasis, I cannot
> change.

If you are quoting my poetry and screw up the line breaks, you can be sure I
will think you have misquoted me.  I broke those lines there for a reason,
and I'll thank you to keep that in mind.  Further, I suspect other poets
will agree.
================
Okay, is that enough to add fuel to the argument fire?  Just remember that
the opinions expressed here are MINE.  ALL MINE.  Express your own, but
remember that my opinions are worth what you pay for them.
================

Tom Murrell
Senior Technical Writer
Opinionated Cuss

 From ??? -at- ??? Sun Jan 00 00:00:00 0000=