Strange behavior when opening frop down lists in dialog boxes

[Leah Smaller]

Good morning all,

FM 7.0 Windows XP

This strange thing is happening in dialog boxes. I wonder if it has always been 
this way (not logical) and I never noticed or this is some new. weird, skewed 
behavior.
When first  opening a dialog (for instance, the Character Designer) it takes 
more than one click on an arrow to open a drop down list (the font list, for 
instance). In fact, in fact it takes about 3 clicks:
Click 1 - nothing happens
Click 2 - the field is now in focus
Click 3 - drop down list, well...drops down.

After this intial 3 click process, any other drop down menu in the dialog box 
opens with the normal one click.
As long as the dialog box stays open the 3 click operation does not return. 
However, after closing the dialog box and opening it again,  3 clicks to open a 
drop down list are necessary.

This, of course, slows down the work pace and it is a pity to add extraneous 
mouse clicks to over worked hands.

Any guesses as how to take care of this annoying problem?

Leah Smaller
Technical Communicator
Certified Feldenkrais Method practitioner
[EMAIL PROTECTED]

What you truly learn best will appear to you later as your own discovery. 
(Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais)
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Notation 'tiff' was referenced but never declared

[Andrey 'ABacus' Bondarenko]

Good time of day,

There is an XSD-file in the structapps.fm. In this file a reference 
exists to another XSD-file

xs:include schemaLocation=common.xsd/

And in common.xsd all notations are defined.

At attempting to open XML-file with

!ENTITY qqq SYSTEM qqq.tif NDATA tiff

FrameMaker 8 issues the message:
Error at line 5, char 16, Message: Notation 'tiff' was referenced but 
never declared

Could someone suggest what's problem?

---
Best regards

Andrey 'ABacus' Bondarenko
mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]

-==-
Programmers often neglect proper consideration of the weak link in the 
software:

the person who will be using it.
-= Leonard Lee =-


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Virus Database (VPS): 000779-0, 2007-10-08
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RE: Strange behavior when opening frop down lists in dialog boxes

[Phil Heron]

Leah,

I believe this is known behaviour when using the Windows Classic theme
in XP.

Could this be your situation?

Phil Heron


-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Leah Smaller
Sent: 10 October 2007 07:52
To: Frame Users
Subject: Strange behavior when opening frop down lists in dialog boxes 

Good morning all,

FM 7.0 Windows XP

This strange thing is happening in dialog boxes. I wonder if it has
always been this way (not logical) and I never noticed or this is some
new. weird, skewed behavior.
When first  opening a dialog (for instance, the Character Designer) it
takes more than one click on an arrow to open a drop down list (the font
list, for instance). In fact, in fact it takes about 3 clicks:
Click 1 - nothing happens
Click 2 - the field is now in focus
Click 3 - drop down list, well...drops down.

After this intial 3 click process, any other drop down menu in the
dialog box opens with the normal one click.
As long as the dialog box stays open the 3 click operation does not
return. However, after closing the dialog box and opening it again,  3
clicks to open a drop down list are necessary.

This, of course, slows down the work pace and it is a pity to add
extraneous mouse clicks to over worked hands.

Any guesses as how to take care of this annoying problem?

Leah Smaller
Technical Communicator
Certified Feldenkrais Method practitioner [EMAIL PROTECTED]

What you truly learn best will appear to you later as your own
discovery. (Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais)
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Solved! Strange behavior when open drop down lists

[Leah Smaller]

Solved!
Using the 'Windows Classic' theme display in Windows XP causes this behavior.

Leah Smaller
Technical Communicator
Certified Feldenkrais Method practitioner
[EMAIL PROTECTED]

What you truly learn best will appear to you later as your own discovery. 
(Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais)
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Changing text styles

[Scott White]

I remember doing this once before but can find the reference in the  
book; how can I change a unique string of text from regular type to  
bold within a document.
I would like to find every reference of lets say ABC Company, Inc.  
and change it to bold with a replace function of some sort. Any help  
would be appreciated.




Scott White
Media Production Manager
Implementation Coordinator
210-704-8239
[EMAIL PROTECTED]



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RE: Changing text styles

[Combs, Richard]

Scott White wrote:

 I remember doing this once before but can find the reference 
 in the book; how can I change a unique string of text from 
 regular type to bold within a document.
 I would like to find every reference of lets say ABC Company, Inc.  
 and change it to bold with a replace function of some sort. 
 Any help would be appreciated.

Put the cursor in some text formatted with the character tag you want to
apply. Select Edit  Copy Special  Character Format to put that
formatting on the clipboard. Then, select Edit  Find/Change. Set Find
to the string you want to format and set Change to By Pasting. 

Note that you'll be applying all the formatting that was at the cursor
location when you did the Copy Special, not just the character tag. So
this works fine if you copy the formatting from a piece of body text and
paste to other pieces of body text. It works not so well going to or
from headings, table text in a different font, etc. I suggest not
rushing to Change All. :-)

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: Changing text styles

[Art Campbell]

Create a string in a file that looks the way you want it to. Define and copy it.
In the SR window, search for the string and replace by pasting.

Art

On 10/10/07, Scott White [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 I remember doing this once before but can find the reference in the
 book; how can I change a unique string of text from regular type to
 bold within a document.
 I would like to find every reference of lets say ABC Company, Inc.
 and change it to bold with a replace function of some sort. Any help
 would be appreciated.



 Scott White
 Media Production Manager
 Implementation Coordinator
 210-704-8239
 [EMAIL PROTECTED]

-- 
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: Changing text styles

[Combs, Richard]

Scott White wrote:

 I would like to find every reference of lets say ABC Company, Inc.  
 and change it to bold with a replace function of some sort. 

I should have also mentioned that a better long-term solution might be
to create a CompanyName variable defined as boldABC Company, Inc. That
way, if management later wants it italic and green, or the name changes,
you can easily update everything by importing the redefined variable to
all your docs. 

The EZVars plugin from Electropubs
(http://www.electropubs.com/downloads.html) lets you find text strings
and replace them with variables, so it would make short work of the task
you face. There's a 30-day trial, so you might want to test it on this
particular problem (it's quite cheap, $10 or $15, to buy if you like
it). 

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: Italics dropping out of TOC

[William Abernathy]

I got no response to the below post. Is this such a well-known FrameMaker bug 
that it merits no response? Did I get you all on a bad day? Or am I just being a 
dunce?


Don't answer that last one.

--W

William Abernathy wrote:

I assume there is some very important reason for the following behavior.

[Frame 7.2, WinXP, Unstructured]

When I italicize a chapter or section heading using the CTRL-I, the 
generated TOC file does not retain the formatting, but maintains the 
cross-reference all the way to the end of the line. Hence:


4.1 Heading with /Italic/ Text

renders as:

4.1 Heading with Italic Text...22

in the TOC, with the whole line linking to the heading on p. 22, but the 
word Italic now rendered in roman.


If, on the other hand, I use an Italic (Emphasis) character format, I 
get the formatting in the generated TOC, but the link breaks at the tag 
boundary. The generated TOC line thus appears as:


4.1 Heading with /Italic/ Text22

However, the link breaks at the boundary between with and Italic.

It there any way around this? Call me a dreamer, but I really want the 
formatting to come through *and* the link not to be broken when I 
generate a TOC.


Thanks in advance.

--William Abernathy



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RE: Notation 'tiff' was referenced but never declared

[Lester C. Smalley]

Andrey -

Whatever schema/DTD is being used in FrameMaker does not declare the
graphic notation TIFF as valid. For example, a DTD would need to include
a line such as :

!NOTATION tiff   PUBLIC -//ALDUS//NOTATION Tagged Image File
Format//EN

On  Wednesday, October 10, 2007 03:23 AM, Andrey 'ABacus' Bondarenko
wrote:

| Good time of day,
|
| There is an XSD-file in the structapps.fm. In this file a reference
| exists to another XSD-file
|  xs:include schemaLocation=common.xsd/
| And in common.xsd all notations are defined.
|
| At attempting to open XML-file with
|  !ENTITY qqq SYSTEM qqq.tif NDATA tiff
| FrameMaker 8 issues the message:
|  Error at line 5, char 16, Message: Notation 'tiff' was referenced
but
|  never declared
| Could someone suggest what's problem?
|
| ---
| Best regards
|
| Andrey 'ABacus' Bondarenko
| mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
|
| -==-
| Programmers often neglect proper consideration of the weak link in the
| software:
| the person who will be using it.
| -= Leonard Lee =-

- Lester 
---
Lester C. Smalley   Email: lsmalley AT infocon DOT com  
Information Consultants, Inc.   Phone: 302-239-2942 FAX: 302-239-1712   
Yorklyn, DE  19736  Web: www.infocon.com
---
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Re: Italics dropping out of TOC

[Stuart Rogers]

William Abernathy wrote:
I got no response to the below post. Is this such a well-known 
FrameMaker bug that it merits no response? Did I get you all on a bad 
day? Or am I just being a dunce?


Don't answer that last one.


(d) Both (a) and (b).

As I understand it, William, this is not a bug; FM is working as 
designed.  Formatting overrides are not carried over to generated files, 
so your CTRL-I has no effect in the TOC.


Character tags *are* carried over to generated files, so your italic tag 
does appear in the TOC.  The method FM uses to delimit hyperlinks is to 
look for a change of tag.  So your link ends when the character tag starts.


Perhaps someone else can offer a work-around; I don't know the answer 
myself.  Perhaps the use of an italicized variable??  Framescript??


Good luck,
s.





--W

William Abernathy wrote:

I assume there is some very important reason for the following behavior.

[Frame 7.2, WinXP, Unstructured]

When I italicize a chapter or section heading using the CTRL-I, the 
generated TOC file does not retain the formatting, but maintains the 
cross-reference all the way to the end of the line. Hence:


4.1 Heading with /Italic/ Text

renders as:

4.1 Heading with Italic Text...22

in the TOC, with the whole line linking to the heading on p. 22, but 
the word Italic now rendered in roman.


If, on the other hand, I use an Italic (Emphasis) character format, I 
get the formatting in the generated TOC, but the link breaks at the 
tag boundary. The generated TOC line thus appears as:


4.1 Heading with /Italic/ Text22

However, the link breaks at the boundary between with and Italic.

It there any way around this? Call me a dreamer, but I really want the 
formatting to come through *and* the link not to be broken when I 
generate a TOC.


Thanks in advance.

--William Abernathy


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

srogers phoenix-geophysics com

On the contrary.
-- Henrik Ibsen (last words, after a nurse said he seemed a little 
better.)

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Re: Strange behavior when opening frop down lists in dialog boxes

[Pat Christenson]

Hi Leah -

I had the same problem. Do you have the display theme set to Windows  
Classic? That's what was causing it for me. I had to change the theme  
to Windows XP (which I don't like but at least the menus work  
correctly).


Pat Christenson

On Oct 9, 2007, at 11:52 PM, Leah Smaller wrote:


Good morning all,

FM 7.0 Windows XP

This strange thing is happening in dialog boxes. I wonder if it has  
always been this way (not logical) and I never noticed or this is  
some new. weird, skewed behavior.
When first  opening a dialog (for instance, the Character Designer)  
it takes more than one click on an arrow to open a drop down list  
(the font list, for instance). In fact, in fact it takes about 3  
clicks:

Click 1 - nothing happens
Click 2 - the field is now in focus
Click 3 - drop down list, well...drops down.

After this intial 3 click process, any other drop down menu in the  
dialog box opens with the normal one click.
As long as the dialog box stays open the 3 click operation does not  
return. However, after closing the dialog box and opening it  
again,  3 clicks to open a drop down list are necessary.


This, of course, slows down the work pace and it is a pity to add  
extraneous mouse clicks to over worked hands.


Any guesses as how to take care of this annoying problem?

Leah Smaller
Technical Communicator
Certified Feldenkrais Method practitioner
[EMAIL PROTECTED]

What you truly learn best will appear to you later as your own  
discovery. (Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais)

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Re: Italics dropping out of TOC

[Peter Gold]

Hi, William:

It's not completely clear to me how you are applying the character
format. A little more information would help the troubleshooting
efforts.

Are you using a building block like char_format_name to the TOC
entry prototype line(s) on the TOC Reference page, or are you applying
the character format to selected building blocks?

Can you post the TOC Reference page lines?

Thanks.

Regards,

Peter
___
Peter Gold
KnowHow ProServices


On 10/10/07, William Abernathy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 I got no response to the below post. Is this such a well-known FrameMaker bug
 that it merits no response? Did I get you all on a bad day? Or am I just 
 being a
 dunce?

 Don't answer that last one.

 --W

 William Abernathy wrote:
  I assume there is some very important reason for the following behavior.
 
  [Frame 7.2, WinXP, Unstructured]
 
  When I italicize a chapter or section heading using the CTRL-I, the
  generated TOC file does not retain the formatting, but maintains the
  cross-reference all the way to the end of the line. Hence:
 
  4.1 Heading with /Italic/ Text
 
  renders as:
 
  4.1 Heading with Italic Text...22
 
  in the TOC, with the whole line linking to the heading on p. 22, but the
  word Italic now rendered in roman.
 
  If, on the other hand, I use an Italic (Emphasis) character format, I
  get the formatting in the generated TOC, but the link breaks at the tag
  boundary. The generated TOC line thus appears as:
 
  4.1 Heading with /Italic/ Text22
 
  However, the link breaks at the boundary between with and Italic.
 
  It there any way around this? Call me a dreamer, but I really want the
  formatting to come through *and* the link not to be broken when I
  generate a TOC.
 
  Thanks in advance.
 
  --William Abernathy
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RE: Italics dropping out of TOC

[Fred Ridder]

[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 
 As I understand it, William, this is not a bug; FM is working as 
 designed. Formatting overrides are not carried over to generated files, 
 so your CTRL-I has no effect in the TOC.
  Character tags *are* carried over to generated files, so your italic tag 
 does appear in the TOC. The method FM uses to delimit hyperlinks is to 
 look for a change of tag. So your link ends when the character tag starts.
  Perhaps someone else can offer a work-around; I don't know the answer 
 myself. Perhaps the use of an italicized variable?? Framescript??
 
What Stuart says is correct, but there's one more fact that is necessary
for a full understanding. The additional piece of information is that the 
active area (hot spot) for a hyperlink extends from the hypertext marker 
to the end of the paragraph or a change in character-level formatting
(which can include the application of a character tag that does not 
actually change the formatting of the text). Once you understand this,
you will readily see that it is not possible to have the active area for a 
TOC entry to extend across the entire entry (text plus page number)
unless the page number has exactly the same character formatting as
the text extracted from the heading unless you specifically apply a 
workaround. My own preference is to not use character formatting in
headings so that I don't have to worry about this issue in the first place.
 
As to workarounds, one that *might* work is to copy each hypertext 
marker in turn and paste a the copy immediately adjacent to the page
number (or maybe right after the text, just before the tab that 
right-aligns the page number). I have *not* tested this myself, so I 
don't know whether FrameMaker likes duplicated hypertext markers 
or not, but I think it should work, and it's somethign that could be 
scripted. 
 
But I'd still vote for not using character formatting in headings.
 
Fred Ridder
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Re: Italics dropping out of TOC

[Rick Quatro]

Hi William,

I have solved this problem with two different methods in the past.

1) Use an Acrobat JavaScript script to extend the short links in the PDF 
file.


2) Use a FrameScript script to duplicate the Hypertext marker at each 
character property change in each TOC paragraph.


I prefer the second method, as it can be triggered automatically whenever 
the TOC is generated.


Rick Quatro
Carmen Publishing
585-659-8267
www.frameexpert.com


I got no response to the below post. Is this such a well-known FrameMaker 
bug that it merits no response? Did I get you all on a bad day? Or am I 
just being a dunce?


Don't answer that last one.

--W


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Re: Strange behavior when opening frop down lists in dialog boxes

[Himanshu Marathe]

Hi,

I also faced this problem. But, I worked on a remote pc and used
Microsoft Remote Desktop. I never faced this problem on a local
machine.

Is your FM installed on a remote PC?


--
Himanshu
http://hellotw.freeforums.org/index.php


On 10/10/07, Leah Smaller [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 Good morning all,

 FM 7.0 Windows XP

 This strange thing is happening in dialog boxes. I wonder if it has always 
 been this way (not logical) and I never noticed or this is some new. weird, 
 skewed behavior.
 When first  opening a dialog (for instance, the Character Designer) it takes 
 more than one click on an arrow to open a drop down list (the font list, for 
 instance). In fact, in fact it takes about 3 clicks:
 Click 1 - nothing happens
 Click 2 - the field is now in focus
 Click 3 - drop down list, well...drops down.

 After this intial 3 click process, any other drop down menu in the dialog box 
 opens with the normal one click.
 As long as the dialog box stays open the 3 click operation does not return. 
 However, after closing the dialog box and opening it again,  3 clicks to open 
 a drop down list are necessary.

 This, of course, slows down the work pace and it is a pity to add extraneous 
 mouse clicks to over worked hands.

 Any guesses as how to take care of this annoying problem?

 Leah Smaller
 Technical Communicator
 Certified Feldenkrais Method practitioner
 [EMAIL PROTECTED]

 What you truly learn best will appear to you later as your own discovery. 
 (Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais)
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Any experience with TrackChanges tool from Integrated Technologies

[Ron Miller]

Wondering if anyone has experience using Track Changes from  
integrated technologies. Could you share your impressions with me?


Thanks,
Ron

Ron Miller
Freelance Technology Writing Since 1988
Contributing Editor, EContent Magazine

email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
blog: http://byronmiller.typepad.com
web: http://www.ronsmiller.com

Winner of the 2006 and 2007 Apex Award for Publication Excellence/ 
Feature Writing




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looking for conditional text scenarios

[David Valiulis]

Greetings,

Here at Adobe we're looking for real-world uses of conditional text.
We'd be very interested in a summary of some of the interesting uses out
there, including the condition tags you've defined and the output
desired. We'd also like to hear of any limitations you've encountered in
either Frame 7 or Frame 8.

For example, you might say...
I work on a doc set that must output to print and to the web in two
different versions, Mac and Windows. We've set up 6 conditions:
WinPrint, WinWeb, WinBoth, MacPrint, MacWeb, and MacBoth.

Many thanks.

/dave valiulis
Adobe systems


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RE: Any experience with TrackChanges tool from Integrated Technologies

[Flato, Gillian]

Frame 8 has track changes built in. 


-Gillian


-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Ron Miller
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 5:58 AM
To: framers@lists.frameusers.com
Subject: Any experience with TrackChanges tool from Integrated
Technologies

Wondering if anyone has experience using Track Changes from  
integrated technologies. Could you share your impressions with me?

Thanks,
Ron

Ron Miller
Freelance Technology Writing Since 1988
Contributing Editor, EContent Magazine

email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
blog: http://byronmiller.typepad.com
web: http://www.ronsmiller.com

Winner of the 2006 and 2007 Apex Award for Publication Excellence/ 
Feature Writing



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Re: Any experience with TrackChanges tool from Integrated Technologies

[Art Campbell]

I played with a beta of it some time ago. The code I had didn't work
well and crashed FM.
I didn't purchase it. Of course, YMMV; they may have worked out all
the kinks. But it wasn't as smoothly integrated as the built-in in Rev
8.

Art

On 10/10/07, Ron Miller [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 Wondering if anyone has experience using Track Changes from
 integrated technologies. Could you share your impressions with me?

 Thanks,
 Ron

 Ron Miller
 Freelance Technology Writing Since 1988
 Contributing Editor, EContent Magazine

 email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 blog: http://byronmiller.typepad.com
 web: http://www.ronsmiller.com

 Winner of the 2006 and 2007 Apex Award for Publication Excellence/
 Feature Writing



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-- 
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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radical revamping of techpubs

[mulholland4]

Hi,
I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. These
would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that none
of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
primary market for the documentation.)
3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the documents
written by the software specialists.

The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
students to come in and edit.

I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us who
just want to run screaming!

thanks
Mulholland
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FM6 on Vista and MicroType Toolbar Express

[Ragnar Hanås]

Hello,

I´ve just began using FM 6 on Vista and the program runs fine after
installing the Adobe fixes. But I cannot get the MicroType Toolbar to work
(I downloaded the free version some years ago and have had great use of it).
I copied the maker.ini and the files to another computer running XP and now
the toolbar shows nicely. Am I wasting my time trying to get the Toolbar to
work with Vista or??

(In Vista, the list of fonts from the Menu row lists a huge number of fonts
but stops at those beginning with M so I need the drop-down list in Toolbar
Express) 

Thanks,

Ragnar Hanas

Uddevalla Hospital, Sweden

PS I still use the good old 6.0 for compatibility with a lot of co-workers
around the world

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RE: radical revamping of techpubs

[Rene Stephenson]

There's also a heckuva lot more to editing than just a grammar check by a bunch 
of kids (or any grammar-checker, for that matter).
   
  Rene Stephenson

Denise L. Moss-Fritch [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
  Good Day Mulholland,

Sorry, in my opinion the plan is not in the best interest of the customers.
There is far more to writing documentation than knowing the application
being developed.

Will the documentation be print (or Acrobat files), or online help? Each
format has a different structure and requires a different form of authoring.
While print (or Acrobat) form follows a book format of typically related
information that includes transitions between paragraphs, sections, and
chapters; online help follows a different (individual topic) format.
Typically online help topics follow a pattern of overview, drilling down to
specific topics that further explain, describe the interface and option, and
offer specific procedures. However, such a process does not describe higher
level processes that might include several options (dialogs or tabs).

If you really must follow such a process because of costs (although
typically tech writers are paid half of what developers earn), remember you
will be taking development time from your staff. I would also recommend an
initial development edit that would review the structure and basic types of
content of your documentation. The second edit would focus upon language.

Best,

Denise L. Moss-Fritch





-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of mulholland4
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 12:55 PM
To: framers@lists.frameusers.com
Subject: radical revamping of techpubs

Hi,
I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. These
would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that none
of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
primary market for the documentation.)
3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the documents
written by the software specialists.

The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
students to come in and edit.

I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us who
just want to run screaming!

thanks
Mulholland
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Re: radical revamping of techpubs

[Art Campbell]

On a personal basis, it'd mean that if anyone in management was even
floating the idea, that it's past time to rev your resume because the
company ain't going to be around long.
;- )


Art


On 10/10/07, mulholland4 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 Hi,
 I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
 documentation within a company?

 1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
 2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
 software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. These
 would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that none
 of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
 primary market for the documentation.)
 3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the documents
 written by the software specialists.

 The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
 developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
 students to come in and edit.

 I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us who
 just want to run screaming!

 thanks
 Mulholland
 ___




-- 
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: radical revamping of techpubs

[Rene Stephenson]

Yep, they would: extra money in the corporate pockets to show for the lower 
quality to the customers and resultant increase in customer calls for tech 
support. You get what you pay for...a short-term gain.
   
  Rene

Steve Rickaby [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
  At 15:54 -0400 10/10/07, mulholland4 wrote:

I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

Off-hand I would hazard a guess that any company trying this would reap the 
rewards quite quickly.

-- 
Steve
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RE: radical revamping of techpubs

[Denise L. Moss-Fritch]

Good Day Mulholland,

Sorry, in my opinion the plan is not in the best interest of the customers.
There is far more to writing documentation than knowing the application
being developed.

Will the documentation be print (or Acrobat files), or online help? Each
format has a different structure and requires a different form of authoring.
While print (or Acrobat) form follows a book format of typically related
information that includes transitions between paragraphs, sections, and
chapters; online help follows a different (individual topic) format.
Typically online help topics follow a pattern of overview, drilling down to
specific topics that further explain, describe the interface and option, and
offer specific procedures. However, such a process does not describe higher
level processes that might include several options (dialogs or tabs).

If you really must follow such a process because of costs (although
typically tech writers are paid half of what developers earn), remember you
will be taking development time from your staff. I would also recommend an
initial development edit that would review the structure and basic types of
content of your documentation. The second edit would focus upon language.

Best,

 Denise L. Moss-Fritch





-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of mulholland4
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 12:55 PM
To: framers@lists.frameusers.com
Subject: radical revamping of techpubs

Hi,
I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. These
would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that none
of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
primary market for the documentation.)
3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the documents
written by the software specialists.

The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
students to come in and edit.

I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us who
just want to run screaming!

thanks
Mulholland
___


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Re: radical revamping of techpubs

[Susan Modlin]

Sounds like a recipe for disaster to me -- at least as far as the customer is 
concerned. Although the company might enjoy a short-term savings, they'll pay 
for it in the longer term in increased support costs (unless they off-shore 
that too) and customer dissatisfaction. 

...Susan

- Original Message 
From: mulholland4 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: framers@lists.frameusers.com
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 12:54:37 PM
Subject: radical revamping of techpubs


Hi,
I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation.
 These
would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that
 none
of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
primary market for the documentation.)
3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the
 documents
written by the software specialists.

The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
students to come in and edit.

I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us
 who
just want to run screaming!

thanks
Mulholland
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Pinpoint customers who are looking for what you sell. 
http://searchmarketing.yahoo.com/
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Re: Italics dropping out of TOC

[Jeremy H. Griffith]

On Wed, 10 Oct 2007 08:43:42 -0700, William Abernathy 
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

Is this such a well-known FrameMaker bug 
that it merits no response?

That's probably the consensus.  But, IIRC, there *is* a
workaround for your specific case.  You can't use a char
format (for the reasons everyone has mentioned), and any
char formatting overrides are not preserved in the TOC.  
But *font* changes are.  So if you specify an Italic font 
as an override in your title, like VerdanaItalic, rather 
than setting the format to italic, you may get what you want.

You may also need to add a setting in maker.ini for [Fonts]
and/or [WindowsToFrameFontAliases], which may be more trouble
than it's worth to you.  I don't recall just how that setting
needs to be, but maybe someone else here does.

I have *not* tested this...  ;-)

-- Jeremy H. Griffith, at Omni Systems Inc.
  [EMAIL PROTECTED]  http://www.omsys.com/
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Re: radical revamping of techpubs

[Chris Borokowski]

My prediction is that it will be a partial disaster, and then they'll
hire a contractor to come clean up. Few companies are interested in
keeping technical writers around full time, since they're only needed
at the end of the design process. They want dual roles, such as project
manager technical writers, developer technical writers and probably
even technical writers who can cook to reduce catering costs.

--- Susan Modlin [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

 Sounds like a recipe for disaster to me -- at least as far as the
 customer is concerned. Although the company might enjoy a short-term
 savings, they'll pay for it in the longer term in increased support
 costs (unless they off-shore that too) and customer dissatisfaction. 
 
 ...Susan
 
 - Original Message 
 From: mulholland4 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 To: framers@lists.frameusers.com
 Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 12:54:37 PM
 Subject: radical revamping of techpubs
 
 
 Hi,
 I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for
 writing
 documentation within a company?
 
 1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
 2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know
 the
 software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation.
  These
 would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that
  none
 of these people has English as a first language, despite this being
 the
 primary market for the documentation.)
 3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the
  documents
 written by the software specialists.
 
 The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
 developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get
 university
 students to come in and edit.
 
 I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of
 us
  who
 just want to run screaming!
 
 thanks
 Mulholland
 ___
 
 
 You are currently subscribed to Framers as [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 
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 To unsubscribe send a blank email to 
 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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 Send administrative questions to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Visit
 http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.
 
 
 
 
 
 



 Pinpoint customers who are looking for what you sell. 
 http://searchmarketing.yahoo.com/
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 http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.
 


http://technical-writing.dionysius.com/
technical writing | consulting | development


   

Building a website is a piece of cake. Yahoo! Small Business gives you all the 
tools to get online.
http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/webhosting 
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RE: radical revamping of techpubs

[Flato, Gillian]

This will be a complete train wreck. 

Here's why:

1. The Developers have no idea how to organize the information
2. When they write, they are completely illiterate. 
In my company, the Developers write specs for me on each new
feature. They are so illiterate, that I always have to  go to them and
interview them to figure out what the feature actually does.
3. Their knowledge is so advanced that they don't understand the
end-users viewpoint
I can't tell you how many times I have heard, You don't have to
explain that, they'll know how to do that. I have  had to point out
countless times that my audience is an end-user new on the job who knows
nothing and I have to   explain everything to him.

You're company may be looking at this because some number cruncher
thinks it will save money, but the real cost will be a severe drop in
quality, which will cause you to lose customers, lose sales, lose
revenue etc. etc.


Thank you,

 
Gillian Flato
Technical Writer (Software)
nanometrics
1550 Buckeye Dr. 
Milpitas, CA. 95035
408.545.6316
408.232.5911
[EMAIL PROTECTED]


-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Susan Modlin
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 2:42 PM
To: mulholland4; framers@lists.frameusers.com
Subject: Re: radical revamping of techpubs

Sounds like a recipe for disaster to me -- at least as far as the
customer is concerned. Although the company might enjoy a short-term
savings, they'll pay for it in the longer term in increased support
costs (unless they off-shore that too) and customer dissatisfaction. 

...Susan

- Original Message 
From: mulholland4 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: framers@lists.frameusers.com
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 12:54:37 PM
Subject: radical revamping of techpubs


Hi,
I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation.
 These
would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that
 none
of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
primary market for the documentation.)
3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the
 documents
written by the software specialists.

The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
students to come in and edit.

I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us
 who
just want to run screaming!

thanks
Mulholland
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Re: radical revamping of techpubs

[Steve Rickaby]

At 15:54 -0400 10/10/07, mulholland4 wrote:

I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

Off-hand I would hazard a guess that any company trying this would reap the 
rewards quite quickly.

-- 
Steve
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Re: radical revamping of techpubs

[Bill Swallow]

 1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
 2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
 software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. These
 would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that none
 of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
 primary market for the documentation.)
 3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the documents
 written by the software specialists.

 The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
 developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
 students to come in and edit.

The plan as a whole is about a buoyant as a brick, but parts have
merit. Having people who know the software inside and out as writers
is optimal - this is the level at which a tech writer should be
functioning. Having editors clean up language and control the style to
enforce consistency has merit as well, but hungry college grads are
not the right people for the job either (need talented editors to do
it right).

In the end, your scenario will cost the company more money in the long
run. I'm sure the developers won't want to be writing the docs for
very long, and turnover for the editorial roles will be high. But,
with the right people in the right roles, this could work. We have
developers write first pass documentation for a SDK we produce, and
the writers (among other roles) make the information complete and
polished. Of course, the writers are also busy building sample
applications and tutorials in the meantime.

You need a model where everyone *can* pitch in, but one in which every
role is appreciated and respected. Yours sounds like a quick means to
an end (the end being a craptastic product delivery and a low morale
crew).

-- 
Bill Swallow
HATT List Owner
WWP-Users List Owner
Senior Member STC, TechValley Chapter
STC Single-Sourcing SIG Manager
http://techcommdood.blogspot.com
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Re: radical revamping of techpubs

[Bill Swallow]

I don't buy your few companies generalization. Perhaps small pre-IPO
companies and the like, but I've not met an established company that
didn't have a solid tech writing staff in place.

On 10/10/07, Chris Borokowski [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 My prediction is that it will be a partial disaster, and then they'll
 hire a contractor to come clean up. Few companies are interested in
 keeping technical writers around full time, since they're only needed
 at the end of the design process. They want dual roles, such as project
 manager technical writers, developer technical writers and probably
 even technical writers who can cook to reduce catering costs.

-- 
Bill Swallow
HATT List Owner
WWP-Users List Owner
Senior Member STC, TechValley Chapter
STC Single-Sourcing SIG Manager
http://techcommdood.blogspot.com
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Strange behavior when opening frop down lists in dialog boxes

[Leah Smaller]

Good morning all,

FM 7.0 Windows XP

This strange thing is happening in dialog boxes. I wonder if it has always been 
this way (not logical) and I never noticed or this is some new. weird, skewed 
behavior.
When first  opening a dialog (for instance, the Character Designer) it takes 
more than one click on an arrow to open a drop down list (the font list, for 
instance). In fact, in fact it takes about 3 clicks:
Click 1 - nothing happens
Click 2 - the field is now in focus
Click 3 - drop down list, well...drops down.

After this intial 3 click process, any other drop down menu in the dialog box 
opens with the normal one click.
As long as the dialog box stays open the 3 click operation does not return. 
However, after closing the dialog box and opening it again,  3 clicks to open a 
drop down list are necessary.

This, of course, slows down the work pace and it is a pity to add extraneous 
mouse clicks to over worked hands.

Any guesses as how to take care of this annoying problem?

Leah Smaller
Technical Communicator
Certified Feldenkrais Method practitioner
leah at compulite.com

"What you truly learn best will appear to you later as your own discovery." 
(Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais)

Notation 'tiff' was referenced but never declared

[Andrey 'ABacus' Bondarenko]

Good time of day,

There is an XSD-file in the structapps.fm. In this file a reference 
exists to another XSD-file
> 
And in common.xsd all notations are defined.

At attempting to open XML-file with
> 
FrameMaker 8 issues the message:
> "Error at line 5, char 16, Message: Notation 'tiff' was referenced but 
> never declared"
Could someone suggest what's problem?

---
Best regards

Andrey 'ABacus' Bondarenko
mail to: abacus at beriev.com

-==-
Programmers often neglect proper consideration of the weak link in the 
software:
the person who will be using it.
-=< Leonard Lee >=-


---
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Tested on: 2007-10-10 11:23:16
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Strange behavior when opening frop down lists in dialog boxes

[Phil Heron]

Leah,

I believe this is known behaviour when using the "Windows Classic" theme
in XP.

Could this be your situation?

Phil Heron


-Original Message-
From: framers-bounces+phil.heron=coda@lists.frameusers.com
[mailto:framers-bounces+phil.heron=coda.com at lists.frameusers.com] On
Behalf Of Leah Smaller
Sent: 10 October 2007 07:52
To: Frame Users
Subject: Strange behavior when opening frop down lists in dialog boxes 

Good morning all,

FM 7.0 Windows XP

This strange thing is happening in dialog boxes. I wonder if it has
always been this way (not logical) and I never noticed or this is some
new. weird, skewed behavior.
When first  opening a dialog (for instance, the Character Designer) it
takes more than one click on an arrow to open a drop down list (the font
list, for instance). In fact, in fact it takes about 3 clicks:
Click 1 - nothing happens
Click 2 - the field is now in focus
Click 3 - drop down list, well...drops down.

After this intial 3 click process, any other drop down menu in the
dialog box opens with the normal one click.
As long as the dialog box stays open the 3 click operation does not
return. However, after closing the dialog box and opening it again,  3
clicks to open a drop down list are necessary.

This, of course, slows down the work pace and it is a pity to add
extraneous mouse clicks to over worked hands.

Any guesses as how to take care of this annoying problem?

Leah Smaller
Technical Communicator
Certified Feldenkrais Method practitioner leah at compulite.com

"What you truly learn best will appear to you later as your own
discovery." (Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais)
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Solved! Strange behavior when open drop down lists

[Leah Smaller]

Solved!
Using the 'Windows Classic' theme display in Windows XP causes this behavior.

Leah Smaller
Technical Communicator
Certified Feldenkrais Method practitioner
leah at compulite.com

"What you truly learn best will appear to you later as your own discovery." 
(Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais)

Changing text styles

[Scott White]

I remember doing this once before but can find the reference in the  
book; how can I change a unique string of text from regular type to  
bold within a document.
I would like to find every reference of lets say ABC Company, Inc.  
and change it to bold with a replace function of some sort. Any help  
would be appreciated.



Scott White
Media Production Manager
Implementation Coordinator
210-704-8239
swhite at alamark.com

Changing text styles

[Combs, Richard]

Scott White wrote:

> I remember doing this once before but can find the reference 
> in the book; how can I change a unique string of text from 
> regular type to bold within a document.
> I would like to find every reference of lets say ABC Company, Inc.  
> and change it to bold with a replace function of some sort. 
> Any help would be appreciated.

Put the cursor in some text formatted with the character tag you want to
apply. Select Edit > Copy Special > Character Format to put that
formatting on the clipboard. Then, select Edit > Find/Change. Set Find
to the string you want to format and set Change to By Pasting. 

Note that you'll be applying all the formatting that was at the cursor
location when you did the Copy Special, not just the character tag. So
this works fine if you copy the formatting from a piece of body text and
paste to other pieces of body text. It works not so well going to or
from headings, table text in a different font, etc. I suggest not
rushing to Change All. :-)

HTH!
Richard


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

Changing text styles

[Art Campbell]

Create a string in a file that looks the way you want it to. Define and copy it.
In the S window, search for the string and replace by pasting.

Art

On 10/10/07, Scott White  wrote:
> I remember doing this once before but can find the reference in the
> book; how can I change a unique string of text from regular type to
> bold within a document.
> I would like to find every reference of lets say ABC Company, Inc.
> and change it to bold with a replace function of some sort. Any help
> would be appreciated.
>
>
>
> Scott White
> Media Production Manager
> Implementation Coordinator
> 210-704-8239
> swhite at alamark.com

-- 
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

Changing text styles

[Yves Barbion]

Hi Scott,

you can do this as follows:

   1. Create a character format, for example , in which you
  only specify that Weight should be Bold. Make sure that the other
  properties (Family, Size, Angle...) are set to As Is. You can
  easily do this by clicking outside the text frame when you have
  the Character Designer open.
   2. Create a user variable, for example "company_name", with a
  definition like this ABC Company, Inc.
   3. Find the first occurrence of ABC Company, Inc. and replace it with
  the company_name user variable.
   4. Copy this variable.
   5. Find: ABC Company, Inc. and Change: By Pasting.

Good luck and best regards


Yves Barbion 
Documentation Architect
Adobe-Certified FrameMaker Instructor


Scripto bvba
Asselsstraat 65
9031 Gent
Belgium
T: +32 494 12 01 89
F: +32 9 366 50 23
BTW (VAT) BE 0886.192.394
skype: yves.barbion




Scott White wrote:
> I remember doing this once before but can find the reference in the 
> book; how can I change a unique string of text from regular type to 
> bold within a document.
> I would like to find every reference of lets say ABC Company, Inc. and 
> change it to bold with a replace function of some sort. Any help would 
> be appreciated.
>
>
>
> Scott White
> Media Production Manager
> Implementation Coordinator
> 210-704-8239
> swhite at alamark.com
>
>
>
> ___
>
>
> You are currently subscribed to Framers as yves.barbion at gmail.com.
>
> Send list messages to framers at lists.frameusers.com.
>
> To unsubscribe send a blank email 
> toframers-unsubscribe at lists.frameusers.com
> or visit 
> http://lists.frameusers.com/mailman/options/framers/yves.barbion%40gmail.com 
>
>
> Send administrative questions to listadmin at frameusers.com. Visit
> http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.
>

Changing text styles

[Combs, Richard]

Scott White wrote:

> I would like to find every reference of lets say ABC Company, Inc.  
> and change it to bold with a replace function of some sort. 

I should have also mentioned that a better long-term solution might be
to create a CompanyName variable defined as ABC Company, Inc. That
way, if management later wants it italic and green, or the name changes,
you can easily update everything by importing the redefined variable to
all your docs. 

The EZVars plugin from Electropubs
(http://www.electropubs.com/downloads.html) lets you find text strings
and replace them with variables, so it would make short work of the task
you face. There's a 30-day trial, so you might want to test it on this
particular problem (it's quite cheap, $10 or $15, to buy if you like
it). 

Richard


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

Italics dropping out of TOC

[William Abernathy]

I got no response to the below post. Is this such a well-known FrameMaker bug 
that it merits no response? Did I get you all on a bad day? Or am I just being 
a 
dunce?

Don't answer that last one.

--W

William Abernathy wrote:
> I assume there is some very important reason for the following behavior.
> 
> [Frame 7.2, WinXP, Unstructured]
> 
> When I italicize a chapter or section heading using the CTRL-I, the 
> generated TOC file does not retain the formatting, but maintains the 
> cross-reference all the way to the end of the line. Hence:
> 
> 4.1 Heading with /Italic/ Text
> 
> renders as:
> 
> 4.1 Heading with Italic Text...22
> 
> in the TOC, with the whole line linking to the heading on p. 22, but the 
> word Italic now rendered in roman.
> 
> If, on the other hand, I use an Italic (Emphasis) character format, I 
> get the formatting in the generated TOC, but the link breaks at the tag 
> boundary. The generated TOC line thus appears as:
> 
> 4.1 Heading with /Italic/ Text22
> 
> However, the link breaks at the boundary between "with" and "Italic."
> 
> It there any way around this? Call me a dreamer, but I really want the 
> formatting to come through *and* the link not to be broken when I 
> generate a TOC.
> 
> Thanks in advance.
> 
> --William Abernathy

Notation 'tiff' was referenced but never declared

[Lester C. Smalley]

Andrey -

Whatever schema/DTD is being used in FrameMaker does not declare the
graphic notation TIFF as valid. For example, a DTD would need to include
a line such as :



On  Wednesday, October 10, 2007 03:23 AM, Andrey 'ABacus' Bondarenko
wrote:

| Good time of day,
|
| There is an XSD-file in the structapps.fm. In this file a reference
| exists to another XSD-file
| > 
| And in common.xsd all notations are defined.
|
| At attempting to open XML-file with
| > 
| FrameMaker 8 issues the message:
| > "Error at line 5, char 16, Message: Notation 'tiff' was referenced
but
| > never declared"
| Could someone suggest what's problem?
|
| ---
| Best regards
|
| Andrey 'ABacus' Bondarenko
| mail to: abacus at beriev.com
|
| -==-
| Programmers often neglect proper consideration of the weak link in the
| software:
| the person who will be using it.
| -=< Leonard Lee >=-

- Lester 
---
Lester C. Smalley   Email: lsmalley AT infocon DOT com  
Information Consultants, Inc.   Phone: 302-239-2942 FAX: 302-239-1712   
Yorklyn, DE  19736  Web: www.infocon.com
---

Italics dropping out of TOC

[Stuart Rogers]

William Abernathy wrote:
> I got no response to the below post. Is this such a well-known 
> FrameMaker bug that it merits no response? Did I get you all on a bad 
> day? Or am I just being a dunce?
> 
> Don't answer that last one.

(d) Both (a) and (b).

As I understand it, William, this is not a bug; FM is working as 
designed.  Formatting overrides are not carried over to generated files, 
so your CTRL-I has no effect in the TOC.

Character tags *are* carried over to generated files, so your italic tag 
does appear in the TOC.  The method FM uses to delimit hyperlinks is to 
look for a change of tag.  So your link ends when the character tag starts.

Perhaps someone else can offer a work-around; I don't know the answer 
myself.  Perhaps the use of an italicized variable??  Framescript??

Good luck,
s.



> 
> --W
> 
> William Abernathy wrote:
>> I assume there is some very important reason for the following behavior.
>>
>> [Frame 7.2, WinXP, Unstructured]
>>
>> When I italicize a chapter or section heading using the CTRL-I, the 
>> generated TOC file does not retain the formatting, but maintains the 
>> cross-reference all the way to the end of the line. Hence:
>>
>> 4.1 Heading with /Italic/ Text
>>
>> renders as:
>>
>> 4.1 Heading with Italic Text...22
>>
>> in the TOC, with the whole line linking to the heading on p. 22, but 
>> the word Italic now rendered in roman.
>>
>> If, on the other hand, I use an Italic (Emphasis) character format, I 
>> get the formatting in the generated TOC, but the link breaks at the 
>> tag boundary. The generated TOC line thus appears as:
>>
>> 4.1 Heading with /Italic/ Text22
>>
>> However, the link breaks at the boundary between "with" and "Italic."
>>
>> It there any way around this? Call me a dreamer, but I really want the 
>> formatting to come through *and* the link not to be broken when I 
>> generate a TOC.
>>
>> Thanks in advance.
>>
>> --William Abernathy

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

srogers phoenix-geophysics com

"On the contrary."
-- Henrik Ibsen (last words, after a nurse said he "seemed a little 
better.")

Strange behavior when opening frop down lists in dialog boxes

[Pat Christenson]

Hi Leah -

I had the same problem. Do you have the display theme set to Windows  
Classic? That's what was causing it for me. I had to change the theme  
to Windows XP (which I don't like but at least the menus work  
correctly).

Pat Christenson

On Oct 9, 2007, at 11:52 PM, Leah Smaller wrote:

> Good morning all,
>
> FM 7.0 Windows XP
>
> This strange thing is happening in dialog boxes. I wonder if it has  
> always been this way (not logical) and I never noticed or this is  
> some new. weird, skewed behavior.
> When first  opening a dialog (for instance, the Character Designer)  
> it takes more than one click on an arrow to open a drop down list  
> (the font list, for instance). In fact, in fact it takes about 3  
> clicks:
> Click 1 - nothing happens
> Click 2 - the field is now in focus
> Click 3 - drop down list, well...drops down.
>
> After this intial 3 click process, any other drop down menu in the  
> dialog box opens with the normal one click.
> As long as the dialog box stays open the 3 click operation does not  
> return. However, after closing the dialog box and opening it  
> again,  3 clicks to open a drop down list are necessary.
>
> This, of course, slows down the work pace and it is a pity to add  
> extraneous mouse clicks to over worked hands.
>
> Any guesses as how to take care of this annoying problem?
>
> Leah Smaller
> Technical Communicator
> Certified Feldenkrais Method practitioner
> leah at compulite.com
>
> "What you truly learn best will appear to you later as your own  
> discovery." (Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais)
> ___
>
>
> You are currently subscribed to Framers as pxenson at comcast.net.
>
> Send list messages to framers at lists.frameusers.com.
>
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> framers-unsubscribe at lists.frameusers.com
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> %40comcast.net
>
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> http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.

Italics dropping out of TOC

[Peter Gold]

Hi, William:

It's not completely clear to me how you are applying the character
format. A little more information would help the troubleshooting
efforts.

Are you using a building block like  to the TOC
entry prototype line(s) on the TOC Reference page, or are you applying
the character format to selected building blocks?

Can you post the TOC Reference page lines?

Thanks.

Regards,

Peter
___
Peter Gold
KnowHow ProServices


On 10/10/07, William Abernathy  wrote:
> I got no response to the below post. Is this such a well-known FrameMaker bug
> that it merits no response? Did I get you all on a bad day? Or am I just 
> being a
> dunce?
>
> Don't answer that last one.
>
> --W
>
> William Abernathy wrote:
> > I assume there is some very important reason for the following behavior.
> >
> > [Frame 7.2, WinXP, Unstructured]
> >
> > When I italicize a chapter or section heading using the CTRL-I, the
> > generated TOC file does not retain the formatting, but maintains the
> > cross-reference all the way to the end of the line. Hence:
> >
> > 4.1 Heading with /Italic/ Text
> >
> > renders as:
> >
> > 4.1 Heading with Italic Text...22
> >
> > in the TOC, with the whole line linking to the heading on p. 22, but the
> > word Italic now rendered in roman.
> >
> > If, on the other hand, I use an Italic (Emphasis) character format, I
> > get the formatting in the generated TOC, but the link breaks at the tag
> > boundary. The generated TOC line thus appears as:
> >
> > 4.1 Heading with /Italic/ Text22
> >
> > However, the link breaks at the boundary between "with" and "Italic."
> >
> > It there any way around this? Call me a dreamer, but I really want the
> > formatting to come through *and* the link not to be broken when I
> > generate a TOC.
> >
> > Thanks in advance.
> >
> > --William Abernathy

Italics dropping out of TOC

[Fred Ridder]

srogers at phoenix-geophysics.com wrote:
> 
> As I understand it, William, this is not a bug; FM is working as 
> designed. Formatting overrides are not carried over to generated files, 
> so your CTRL-I has no effect in the TOC.
> > Character tags *are* carried over to generated files, so your italic tag 
> does appear in the TOC. The method FM uses to delimit hyperlinks is to 
> look for a change of tag. So your link ends when the character tag starts.
> > Perhaps someone else can offer a work-around; I don't know the answer 
> myself. Perhaps the use of an italicized variable?? Framescript??

What Stuart says is correct, but there's one more fact that is necessary
for a full understanding. The additional piece of information is that the 
active area ("hot spot") for a hyperlink extends from the hypertext marker 
to the end of the paragraph or a change in character-level formatting
(which can include the application of a character tag that does not 
actually change the formatting of the text). Once you understand this,
you will readily see that it is not possible to have the active area for a 
TOC entry to extend across the entire entry (text plus page number)
unless the page number has exactly the same character formatting as
the text extracted from the heading unless you specifically apply a 
workaround. My own preference is to not use character formatting in
headings so that I don't have to worry about this issue in the first place.

As to workarounds, one that *might* work is to copy each hypertext 
marker in turn and paste a the copy immediately adjacent to the page
number (or maybe right after the text, just before the tab that 
right-aligns the page number). I have *not* tested this myself, so I 
don't know whether FrameMaker likes duplicated hypertext markers 
or not, but I think it should work, and it's somethign that could be 
scripted. 

But I'd still vote for not using character formatting in headings.

Fred Ridder
_
Help yourself to FREE treats served up daily at the Messenger Caf?. Stop by 
today.
http://www.cafemessenger.com/info/info_sweetstuff2.html?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_OctWLtagline

Italics dropping out of TOC

[Rick Quatro]

Hi William,

I have solved this problem with two different methods in the past.

1) Use an Acrobat JavaScript script to extend the short links in the PDF 
file.

2) Use a FrameScript script to duplicate the Hypertext marker at each 
character property change in each TOC paragraph.

I prefer the second method, as it can be triggered automatically whenever 
the TOC is generated.

Rick Quatro
Carmen Publishing
585-659-8267
www.frameexpert.com


>I got no response to the below post. Is this such a well-known FrameMaker 
>bug that it merits no response? Did I get you all on a bad day? Or am I 
>just being a dunce?
>
> Don't answer that last one.
>
> --W

Strange behavior when opening frop down lists in dialog boxes

[Himanshu Marathe]

Hi,

I also faced this problem. But, I worked on a remote pc and used
Microsoft Remote Desktop. I never faced this problem on a local
machine.

Is your FM installed on a remote PC?


--
Himanshu
http://hellotw.freeforums.org/index.php


On 10/10/07, Leah Smaller  wrote:
> Good morning all,
>
> FM 7.0 Windows XP
>
> This strange thing is happening in dialog boxes. I wonder if it has always 
> been this way (not logical) and I never noticed or this is some new. weird, 
> skewed behavior.
> When first  opening a dialog (for instance, the Character Designer) it takes 
> more than one click on an arrow to open a drop down list (the font list, for 
> instance). In fact, in fact it takes about 3 clicks:
> Click 1 - nothing happens
> Click 2 - the field is now in focus
> Click 3 - drop down list, well...drops down.
>
> After this intial 3 click process, any other drop down menu in the dialog box 
> opens with the normal one click.
> As long as the dialog box stays open the 3 click operation does not return. 
> However, after closing the dialog box and opening it again,  3 clicks to open 
> a drop down list are necessary.
>
> This, of course, slows down the work pace and it is a pity to add extraneous 
> mouse clicks to over worked hands.
>
> Any guesses as how to take care of this annoying problem?
>
> Leah Smaller
> Technical Communicator
> Certified Feldenkrais Method practitioner
> leah at compulite.com
>
> "What you truly learn best will appear to you later as your own discovery." 
> (Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais)
> ___
>
>
> You are currently subscribed to Framers as hymarathe.tw at gmail.com.
>
> Send list messages to framers at lists.frameusers.com.
>
> To unsubscribe send a blank email to
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Any experience with TrackChanges tool from Integrated Technologies

[Ron Miller]

Wondering if anyone has experience using Track Changes from  
integrated technologies. Could you share your impressions with me?

Thanks,
Ron

Ron Miller
Freelance Technology Writing Since 1988
Contributing Editor, EContent Magazine

email: ronsmiller at ronsmiller.com
blog: http://byronmiller.typepad.com
web: http://www.ronsmiller.com

Winner of the 2006 and 2007 Apex Award for Publication Excellence/ 
Feature Writing

looking for conditional text scenarios

[David Valiulis]

Greetings,

Here at Adobe we're looking for real-world uses of conditional text.
We'd be very interested in a summary of some of the interesting uses out
there, including the condition tags you've defined and the output
desired. We'd also like to hear of any limitations you've encountered in
either Frame 7 or Frame 8.

For example, you might say...
"I work on a doc set that must output to print and to the web in two
different versions, Mac and Windows. We've set up 6 conditions:
WinPrint, WinWeb, WinBoth, MacPrint, MacWeb, and MacBoth."

Many thanks.

/dave valiulis
Adobe systems

Any experience with TrackChanges tool from Integrated Technologies

[Flato, Gillian]

Frame 8 has track changes built in. 


-Gillian


-Original Message-
From: framers-bounces+gflato=nanometrics@lists.frameusers.com
[mailto:framers-bounces+gflato=nanometrics.com at lists.frameusers.com] On
Behalf Of Ron Miller
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 5:58 AM
To: framers at lists.frameusers.com
Subject: Any experience with TrackChanges tool from Integrated
Technologies

Wondering if anyone has experience using Track Changes from  
integrated technologies. Could you share your impressions with me?

Thanks,
Ron

Ron Miller
Freelance Technology Writing Since 1988
Contributing Editor, EContent Magazine

email: ronsmiller at ronsmiller.com
blog: http://byronmiller.typepad.com
web: http://www.ronsmiller.com

Winner of the 2006 and 2007 Apex Award for Publication Excellence/ 
Feature Writing



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Any experience with TrackChanges tool from Integrated Technologies

[Art Campbell]

I played with a beta of it some time ago. The code I had didn't work
well and crashed FM.
I didn't purchase it. Of course, YMMV; they may have worked out all
the kinks. But it wasn't as smoothly integrated as the built-in in Rev
8.

Art

On 10/10/07, Ron Miller  wrote:
> Wondering if anyone has experience using Track Changes from
> integrated technologies. Could you share your impressions with me?
>
> Thanks,
> Ron
>
> Ron Miller
> Freelance Technology Writing Since 1988
> Contributing Editor, EContent Magazine
>
> email: ronsmiller at ronsmiller.com
> blog: http://byronmiller.typepad.com
> web: http://www.ronsmiller.com
>
> Winner of the 2006 and 2007 Apex Award for Publication Excellence/
> Feature Writing
>
>
>
> ___
>
>
> You are currently subscribed to Framers as art.campbell at gmail.com.
>
> Send list messages to framers at lists.frameusers.com.
>
> To unsubscribe send a blank email to
> framers-unsubscribe at lists.frameusers.com
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>
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>


-- 
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

radical revamping of techpubs

[mulholland4]

Hi,
I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. These
would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that none
of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
primary market for the documentation.)
3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the documents
written by the software specialists.

The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
students to come in and edit.

I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us who
just want to run screaming!

thanks
Mulholland

radical revamping of techpubs

[Denise L. Moss-Fritch]

Good Day Mulholland,

Sorry, in my opinion the plan is not in the best interest of the customers.
There is far more to "writing documentation" than knowing the application
being developed.

Will the documentation be print (or Acrobat files), or online help? Each
format has a different structure and requires a different form of authoring.
While print (or Acrobat) form follows a book format of typically related
information that includes transitions between paragraphs, sections, and
chapters; online help follows a different (individual topic) format.
Typically online help topics follow a pattern of overview, drilling down to
specific topics that further explain, describe the interface and option, and
offer specific procedures. However, such a process does not describe higher
level processes that might include several options (dialogs or tabs).

If you really must follow such a process because of costs (although
typically tech writers are paid half of what developers earn), remember you
will be taking development time from your staff. I would also recommend an
initial development edit that would review the structure and basic types of
content of your documentation. The second edit would focus upon language.

Best,

 Denise L. Moss-Fritch





-Original Message-
From: framers-bounces+d.mossfritch=comcast@lists.frameusers.com
[mailto:framers-bounces+d.mossfritch=comcast.net at lists.frameusers.com] On
Behalf Of mulholland4
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 12:55 PM
To: framers at lists.frameusers.com
Subject: radical revamping of techpubs

Hi,
I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. These
would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that none
of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
primary market for the documentation.)
3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the documents
written by the software specialists.

The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
students to come in and edit.

I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us who
just want to run screaming!

thanks
Mulholland
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radical revamping of techpubs

[Steve Rickaby]

At 15:54 -0400 10/10/07, mulholland4 wrote:

>I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
>documentation within a company?

Off-hand I would hazard a guess that any company trying this would reap the 
rewards quite quickly.

-- 
Steve

radical revamping of techpubs

[Rene Stephenson]

There's also a heckuva lot more to editing than just a grammar check by a bunch 
of kids (or any grammar-checker, for that matter).

  Rene Stephenson

"Denise L. Moss-Fritch"  wrote:
  Good Day Mulholland,

Sorry, in my opinion the plan is not in the best interest of the customers.
There is far more to "writing documentation" than knowing the application
being developed.

Will the documentation be print (or Acrobat files), or online help? Each
format has a different structure and requires a different form of authoring.
While print (or Acrobat) form follows a book format of typically related
information that includes transitions between paragraphs, sections, and
chapters; online help follows a different (individual topic) format.
Typically online help topics follow a pattern of overview, drilling down to
specific topics that further explain, describe the interface and option, and
offer specific procedures. However, such a process does not describe higher
level processes that might include several options (dialogs or tabs).

If you really must follow such a process because of costs (although
typically tech writers are paid half of what developers earn), remember you
will be taking development time from your staff. I would also recommend an
initial development edit that would review the structure and basic types of
content of your documentation. The second edit would focus upon language.

Best,

Denise L. Moss-Fritch





-Original Message-
From: framers-bounces+d.mossfritch=comcast@lists.frameusers.com
[mailto:framers-bounces+d.mossfritch=comcast.net at lists.frameusers.com] On
Behalf Of mulholland4
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 12:55 PM
To: framers at lists.frameusers.com
Subject: radical revamping of techpubs

Hi,
I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. These
would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that none
of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
primary market for the documentation.)
3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the documents
written by the software specialists.

The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
students to come in and edit.

I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us who
just want to run screaming!

thanks
Mulholland
___


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radical revamping of techpubs

[Art Campbell]

On a personal basis, it'd mean that if anyone in management was even
floating the idea, that it's past time to rev your resume because the
company ain't going to be around long.
;- )


Art


On 10/10/07, mulholland4  wrote:
> Hi,
> I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
> documentation within a company?
>
> 1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
> 2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
> software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. These
> would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that none
> of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
> primary market for the documentation.)
> 3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the documents
> written by the software specialists.
>
> The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
> developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
> students to come in and edit.
>
> I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us who
> just want to run screaming!
>
> thanks
> Mulholland
> ___
>
>


-- 
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

radical revamping of techpubs

[Rene Stephenson]

Yep, they would: extra money in the corporate pockets to show for the lower 
quality to the customers and resultant increase in customer calls for tech 
support. You get what you pay for...a short-term gain.

  Rene

Steve Rickaby  wrote:
  At 15:54 -0400 10/10/07, mulholland4 wrote:

>I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
>documentation within a company?

Off-hand I would hazard a guess that any company trying this would reap the 
rewards quite quickly.

-- 
Steve
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radical revamping of techpubs

[Gagne, Bernard (Bolton)]

In my opinion, the developer is the most ill-suited person to be writing
the documentation. Their knowledge of the product is frequently too deep
for the average user and the end result is often woefully inadequate for
said average user. The fact that the developers are not native-English
speakers merely adds insult to injury.
Was this some pencil-pusher's idea of a cost cutting measure? Did he
factor in the cost of all the additional phone support that will now be
required? Or is your firm one of those that charges from the first
minute for any support?

Berny Gagne
Lead Writer
Husky Injection Molding Systems Ltd.
Bolton, Ontario, Canada


-Original Message-
From: framers-bounces+bgagne=husky...@lists.frameusers.com
[mailto:framers-bounces+bgagne=husky.ca at lists.frameusers.com] On Behalf
Of mulholland4
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 3:55 PM
To: framers at lists.frameusers.com
Subject: radical revamping of techpubs

Hi,
I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation.
These would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted
that none of these people has English as a first language, despite this
being the primary market for the documentation.) 3. Hire editing staff
to edit only the language and grammar of the documents written by the
software specialists.

The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
students to come in and edit.

I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us
who just want to run screaming!

thanks
Mulholland
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radical revamping of techpubs

[Susan Modlin]

Sounds like a recipe for disaster to me -- at least as far as the customer is 
concerned. Although the company might enjoy a short-term savings, they'll pay 
for it in the longer term in increased support costs (unless they off-shore 
that too) and customer dissatisfaction. 

...Susan

- Original Message 
From: mulholland4 
To: framers at lists.frameusers.com
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 12:54:37 PM
Subject: radical revamping of techpubs


Hi,
I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation.
 These
would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that
 none
of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
primary market for the documentation.)
3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the
 documents
written by the software specialists.

The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
students to come in and edit.

I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us
 who
just want to run screaming!

thanks
Mulholland
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Pinpoint customers who are looking for what you sell. 
http://searchmarketing.yahoo.com/

Italics dropping out of TOC

[Jeremy H. Griffith]

On Wed, 10 Oct 2007 08:43:42 -0700, William Abernathy 
 wrote:

>Is this such a well-known FrameMaker bug 
>that it merits no response?

That's probably the consensus.  But, IIRC, there *is* a
workaround for your specific case.  You can't use a char
format (for the reasons everyone has mentioned), and any
char formatting overrides are not preserved in the TOC.  
But *font* changes are.  So if you specify an Italic font 
as an override in your title, like VerdanaItalic, rather 
than setting the format to italic, you may get what you want.

You may also need to add a setting in maker.ini for [Fonts]
and/or [WindowsToFrameFontAliases], which may be more trouble
than it's worth to you.  I don't recall just how that setting
needs to be, but maybe someone else here does.

I have *not* tested this...  ;-)

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

radical revamping of techpubs

[Chris Borokowski]

My prediction is that it will be a partial disaster, and then they'll
hire a contractor to come clean up. Few companies are interested in
keeping technical writers around full time, since they're only needed
at the end of the design process. They want dual roles, such as project
manager technical writers, developer technical writers and probably
even technical writers who can cook to reduce catering costs.

--- Susan Modlin  wrote:

> Sounds like a recipe for disaster to me -- at least as far as the
> customer is concerned. Although the company might enjoy a short-term
> savings, they'll pay for it in the longer term in increased support
> costs (unless they off-shore that too) and customer dissatisfaction. 
> 
> ...Susan
> 
> - Original Message 
> From: mulholland4 
> To: framers at lists.frameusers.com
> Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 12:54:37 PM
> Subject: radical revamping of techpubs
> 
> 
> Hi,
> I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for
> writing
> documentation within a company?
> 
> 1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
> 2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know
> the
> software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation.
>  These
> would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that
>  none
> of these people has English as a first language, despite this being
> the
> primary market for the documentation.)
> 3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the
>  documents
> written by the software specialists.
> 
> The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
> developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get
> university
> students to come in and edit.
> 
> I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of
> us
>  who
> just want to run screaming!
> 
> thanks
> Mulholland
> ___
> 
> 
> You are currently subscribed to Framers as smodlin at yahoo.com.
> 
> Send list messages to framers at lists.frameusers.com.
> 
> To unsubscribe send a blank email to 
> framers-unsubscribe at lists.frameusers.com
> or visit
> 
>
http://lists.frameusers.com/mailman/options/framers/smodlin%40yahoo.com
> 
> Send administrative questions to listadmin at frameusers.com. Visit
> http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>
>

> Pinpoint customers who are looking for what you sell. 
> http://searchmarketing.yahoo.com/
> ___
> 
> 
> You are currently subscribed to Framers as athloi at yahoo.com.
> 
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> 


http://technical-writing.dionysius.com/
technical writing | consulting | development




Building a website is a piece of cake. Yahoo! Small Business gives you all the 
tools to get online.
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radical revamping of techpubs

[Flato, Gillian]

This will be a complete train wreck. 

Here's why:

1. The Developers have no idea how to organize the information
2. When they write, they are completely illiterate. 
In my company, the Developers write specs for me on each new
feature. They are so illiterate, that I always have to  go to them and
interview them to figure out what the feature actually does.
3. Their knowledge is so advanced that they don't understand the
end-users viewpoint
I can't tell you how many times I have heard, "You don't have to
explain that, they'll know how to do that." I have  had to point out
countless times that my audience is an end-user new on the job who knows
nothing and I have to   explain everything to him.

You're company may be looking at this because some number cruncher
thinks it will save money, but the real cost will be a severe drop in
quality, which will cause you to lose customers, lose sales, lose
revenue etc. etc.


Thank you,


Gillian Flato
Technical Writer (Software)
nanometrics
1550 Buckeye Dr. 
Milpitas, CA. 95035
408.545.6316
408.232.5911
gflato at nanometrics.com


-Original Message-
From: framers-bounces+gflato=nanometrics@lists.frameusers.com
[mailto:framers-bounces+gflato=nanometrics.com at lists.frameusers.com] On
Behalf Of Susan Modlin
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 2:42 PM
To: mulholland4; framers at lists.frameusers.com
Subject: Re: radical revamping of techpubs

Sounds like a recipe for disaster to me -- at least as far as the
customer is concerned. Although the company might enjoy a short-term
savings, they'll pay for it in the longer term in increased support
costs (unless they off-shore that too) and customer dissatisfaction. 

...Susan

- Original Message 
From: mulholland4 
To: framers at lists.frameusers.com
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 12:54:37 PM
Subject: radical revamping of techpubs


Hi,
I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation.
 These
would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that
 none
of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
primary market for the documentation.)
3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the
 documents
written by the software specialists.

The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
students to come in and edit.

I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us
 who
just want to run screaming!

thanks
Mulholland
___


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radical revamping of techpubs

[Bill Swallow]

> 1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
> 2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
> software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. These
> would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that none
> of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
> primary market for the documentation.)
> 3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the documents
> written by the software specialists.
>
> The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
> developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
> students to come in and edit.

The plan as a whole is about a buoyant as a brick, but parts have
merit. Having people who know the software inside and out as writers
is optimal - this is the level at which a tech writer should be
functioning. Having editors clean up language and control the style to
enforce consistency has merit as well, but hungry college grads are
not the right people for the job either (need talented editors to do
it right).

In the end, your scenario will cost the company more money in the long
run. I'm sure the developers won't want to be writing the docs for
very long, and turnover for the editorial roles will be high. But,
with the right people in the right roles, this could work. We have
developers write first pass documentation for a SDK we produce, and
the writers (among other roles) make the information complete and
polished. Of course, the writers are also busy building sample
applications and tutorials in the meantime.

You need a model where everyone *can* pitch in, but one in which every
role is appreciated and respected. Yours sounds like a quick means to
an end (the end being a craptastic product delivery and a low morale
crew).

-- 
Bill Swallow
HATT List Owner
WWP-Users List Owner
Senior Member STC, TechValley Chapter
STC Single-Sourcing SIG Manager
http://techcommdood.blogspot.com

radical revamping of techpubs

[Bill Swallow]

I don't buy your "few companies" generalization. Perhaps small pre-IPO
companies and the like, but I've not met an established company that
didn't have a solid tech writing staff in place.

On 10/10/07, Chris Borokowski  wrote:
> My prediction is that it will be a partial disaster, and then they'll
> hire a contractor to come clean up. Few companies are interested in
> keeping technical writers around full time, since they're only needed
> at the end of the design process. They want dual roles, such as project
> manager technical writers, developer technical writers and probably
> even technical writers who can cook to reduce catering costs.

-- 
Bill Swallow
HATT List Owner
WWP-Users List Owner
Senior Member STC, TechValley Chapter
STC Single-Sourcing SIG Manager
http://techcommdood.blogspot.com

radical revamping of techpubs

[poshe...@bellsouth.net]

At the civil engineering firm where my wife has been one of the transportation 
engineers for almost 20 years, the story is pretty much the same. That is, the 
engineers are pretty proficient at road design and all that goes into it, but 
their reports (such as Interstate Justification Reports, or "IJR's", for 
instance) simply grate on me when I review a draft copy for my wife.

While it's very true that this or that 30 or 40 page report -- complete with 
graphs, charts and maps -- will hardly be looked at, no one seems to remember 
the old adage, "If the job is worth doing, it's worth doing right."

They figure that not even another engineer is going to look at this stuff. 

Probably the only things I see correctly presented within the reports are the 
tech specs. But the rules of grammar, punctuation and presentation simply fly 
out the window when these babies are assembled before I get one to look at.

Luckily, the ones my wife do are each an improvement over the previous ones.

The firm has no one dedicated to tech writing / tech editing on staff. I've 
approached the firm about reviewing their reports on a contract basis, but 
they're not interested -- yet.

-- Ken in Atlanta



-- Original message from "Flato, Gillian" : -- 


> This will be a complete train wreck. 
> 
> Here's why: 
> 
> 1. The Developers have no idea how to organize the information 
> 2. When they write, they are completely illiterate. 
> In my company, the Developers write specs for me on each new 
> feature. They are so illiterate, that I always have to go to them and 
> interview them to figure out what the feature actually does. 
> 3. Their knowledge is so advanced that they don't understand the 
> end-users viewpoint 
> I can't tell you how many times I have heard, "You don't have to 
> explain that, they'll know how to do that." I have had to point out 
> countless times that my audience is an end-user new on the job who knows 
> nothing and I have to explain everything to him. 
> 
> You're company may be looking at this because some number cruncher 
> thinks it will save money, but the real cost will be a severe drop in 
> quality, which will cause you to lose customers, lose sales, lose 
> revenue etc. etc. 
> 
> 
> Thank you, 
> 
> 
> Gillian Flato 
> Technical Writer (Software) 
> nanometrics 
> 1550 Buckeye Dr. 
> Milpitas, CA. 95035 
> 408.545.6316 
> 408.232.5911 
> gflato at nanometrics.com 
> 
> 
> -Original Message- 
> From: framers-bounces+gflato=nanometrics.com at lists.frameusers.com 
> [mailto:framers-bounces+gflato=nanometrics.com at lists.frameusers.com] On 
> Behalf Of Susan Modlin 
> Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 2:42 PM 
> To: mulholland4; framers at lists.frameusers.com 
> Subject: Re: radical revamping of techpubs 
> 
> Sounds like a recipe for disaster to me -- at least as far as the 
> customer is concerned. Although the company might enjoy a short-term 
> savings, they'll pay for it in the longer term in increased support 
> costs (unless they off-shore that too) and customer dissatisfaction. 
> 
> ...Susan 
> 
> - Original Message  
> From: mulholland4 
> To: framers at lists.frameusers.com 
> Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 12:54:37 PM 
> Subject: radical revamping of techpubs 
> 
> 
> Hi, 
> I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing 
> documentation within a company? 
> 
> 1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs. 
> 2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the 
> software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. 
> These 
> would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that 
> none 
> of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the 
> primary market for the documentation.) 
> 3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the 
> documents 
> written by the software specialists. 
> 
> The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the 
> developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university 
> students to come in and edit. 
> 
> I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us 
> who 
> just want to run screaming! 
> 
> thanks 
> Mulholland 
> ___ 
> 
> 
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> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  
>  
> Pinpoint customers who are looking for what you sell. 
> http://searchmarketing.yahoo.com/ 
> 

radical revamping of techpubs

[John Hedtke]

Just to throw my opinion on the fire as well, yeah, I'd say it's time to 
make like a tree and get outa there.  :)

It's the same old leftovers we've seen a zillion times before.  The fact 
that the developers are not writers >nor< native English speakers just adds 
a comic twist to the incompetence of the people who made such a boneheaded 
decision.  I'm sure that there will be a certain amount of smugness about 
how original they've been, but you may quote me by saying what I always say 
whenever I hear this kind of rank stupidity coming from some Richard 
Cranium type:  "Aye, we've steered onto the rocks.  I ~told~ you it was bad 
luck to steer straight onto the rocks!"

Care to tell us the name of the company so we can short their stock?  :)

Yours truly,

John Hedtke
Author/Consultant/Contract Writer
www.hedtke.com <-- website
Region 7 Director, STC
541-685-5000 (office landline)
541-554-2189 (cell)
john at hedtke.com (primary email)
johnhedtke at aol.com (secondary email)

At 11:47 AM 10/10/2007, mulholland4 wrote:
>Hi,
>I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
>documentation within a company?
>
>1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
>2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
>software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. These
>would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that none
>of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
>primary market for the documentation.)
>3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the documents
>written by the software specialists.
>
>The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
>developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
>students to come in and edit.
>
>I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us who
>just want to run screaming!

radical revamping of techpubs

[Leslie H Schwartz]

They will get exactly what they desirve - a complete disaster.

Companies that do not know the value of technical documentation, user 
documentation, in what ever form it is needed will lose business and market 
share, in the same way that companies that move their customer service call 
centers off shore lose business because of customer dissatisfaction with that 
quality of support.

Technical documentation is something that many managers or owners of business 
think they can cut corners and save money on, but very often that leads to 
lower quality and lower levels of customer satisfaction.

And software enginers have a great set os skills to offer, but technical 
wirting usually isn't one of them they know the software innards but that does 
not mean they know how to create a user document. And you suggested that 
English was a second language for them; when the users get that ESL document, 
they are not going to be happy, and likey the first thing they will think is 
that they probably made a mistake to purchase that product at all; presuming 
they had a choice -since so much of US industry has been moved off shore. So 
people don't have much of a choice now, but that does not mean they are happy 
about it. I know I'm not.

So obviously this was a very loaded question, I would think most technical 
writers based in a market would have the same conclusions I do about the 
scenario.



- Original Message 
From: mulholland4 
To: framers at lists.frameusers.com
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 2:54:37 PM
Subject: radical revamping of techpubs


Hi,
I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. These
would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that none
of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
primary market for the documentation.)
3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the documents
written by the software specialists.

The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
students to come in and edit.

I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us who
just want to run screaming!

thanks
Mulholland
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Any experience with TrackChanges tool from Integrated Technologies

[Miriam Lezak]

Ron --

I used it for a number of years. As time went by, it got more sophisticated, 
but worse. I learned to save early and often, because it crashed with some 
frequency.

The last time I used it, it actually ate a bunch of my added text -- which 
turned out to be a very very bad thing.

It was great in theory, better than the Frame 8 implementation, but in 
practice, I think I wouldn't recommend it.

Miriam

- Original Message - 
From: "Ron Miller" 
To: 
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 8:58 AM
Subject: Any experience with TrackChanges tool from Integrated Technologies


Wondering if anyone has experience using Track Changes from
integrated technologies. Could you share your impressions with me?

Thanks,
Ron

radical revamping of techpubs

[Miriam Lezak]

One word answer: Bad.

Unless they don't care if they have unreadable, unusable, documentation.

Miriam
- Original Message - 
From: "mulholland4" 
To: 
Sent: Wednesday, October 10, 2007 3:54 PM
Subject: radical revamping of techpubs


Hi,
I would like to see what the group thinks of this scenario for writing
documentation within a company?

1. Remove all existing tech writing staff from techpubs.
2. Replace these with software developers and specialists who know the
software inside out and get them to write all of the documentation. These
would now be known as Developer-techwriters. (It should be noted that none
of these people has English as a first language, despite this being the
primary market for the documentation.)
3. Hire editing staff to edit only the language and grammar of the documents
written by the software specialists.

The reasoning behind this scenario is; that this saves money as the
developers know the software, and it is really cheap to get university
students to come in and edit.

I won't make comments on this just now as i'm sure there are many of us who
just want to run screaming!

thanks
Mulholland
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