RE: Is my beloved tool withering on the vine?
Matt Sullivan wrote: FWIW, Flare isn't a structured authoring app, and I don't know enough about AuthorIt to weigh in on it. Author-it offers structured authoring and DITA output as options. Harro de Jong Triview Technical Communication ___ You are currently subscribed to framers as arch...@mail-archive.com. Send list messages to framers@lists.frameusers.com. To unsubscribe send a blank email to framers-unsubscr...@lists.frameusers.com or visit http://lists.frameusers.com/mailman/options/framers/archive%40mail-archive.com Send administrative questions to listad...@frameusers.com. Visit http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.
Re: Is my beloved tool withering on the vine?
If that were true, more people would be doing it. In many contexts, the costs outweigh the benefits. On Sun, Nov 24, 2013 at 9:15 PM, Matt Sullivan m...@mattrsullivan.com wrote: Standardization inevitably leads to structured authoring, DITA or another model. ___ You are currently subscribed to framers as arch...@mail-archive.com. Send list messages to framers@lists.frameusers.com. To unsubscribe send a blank email to framers-unsubscr...@lists.frameusers.com or visit http://lists.frameusers.com/mailman/options/framers/archive%40mail-archive.com Send administrative questions to listad...@frameusers.com. Visit http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.
RE: Is my beloved tool withering on the vine?
At 10:10 + 22/11/13, Harro de Jong wrote: If FrameMaker's reuse options no longer meet your needs, Author-it (and Flare presumably, although I've no experience with it) is a possible replacement. Or (surely?) moving to DITA with Frame? -- Steve ___ You are currently subscribed to framers as arch...@mail-archive.com. Send list messages to framers@lists.frameusers.com. To unsubscribe send a blank email to framers-unsubscr...@lists.frameusers.com or visit http://lists.frameusers.com/mailman/options/framers/archive%40mail-archive.com Send administrative questions to listad...@frameusers.com. Visit http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.
Re: Is my beloved tool withering on the vine?
Standardization inevitably leads to structured authoring, DITA or another model.Structure improves content management, accessibility, localization, and consistency of content.Once you're doing structured authoring, you can use any structured authoring tool you like. Or use multiple tools, if you like…the files are now (presumably) .xml and can be edited by any xml editor. (Kinda like the HTML editor wars a few years ago)In my opinion, FrameMaker has the best mix of price, cost of implementation, cost of maintenance, and existing user base. Put that together with other apps in the TCS, and Adobe's continuing development of the product, and it's tough to make a case for an existing Fm user to switch to another product.FWIW, Flare isn't a structured authoring app, and I don't know enough about AuthorIt to weigh in on it. -MattMatt R. Sullivanco-authorPublishing Fundamentals: Unstructured FrameMaker 11P:714.798.7596 |C:714.585.2335 |m...@mattrsullivan.com@mattrsullivanLinkedInfacebookmattrsullivan.com On Nov 24, 2013, at 3:42 AM, Steve Rickaby srick...@wordmongers.demon.co.uk wrote:At 10:10 + 22/11/13, Harro de Jong wrote:If FrameMaker's reuse options no longer meet your needs, Author-it (and Flare presumably, although I've no experience with it) is a possible replacement.Or (surely?) moving to DITA with Frame?-- Steve___You are currently subscribed to framers as m...@mattrsullivan.com.Send list messages to framers@lists.frameusers.com.To unsubscribe send a blank email toframers-unsubscr...@lists.frameusers.comor visit http://lists.frameusers.com/mailman/options/framers/matt%40mattrsullivan.comSend administrative questions to listad...@frameusers.com. Visithttp://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.___ You are currently subscribed to framers as arch...@mail-archive.com. Send list messages to framers@lists.frameusers.com. To unsubscribe send a blank email to framers-unsubscr...@lists.frameusers.com or visit http://lists.frameusers.com/mailman/options/framers/archive%40mail-archive.com Send administrative questions to listad...@frameusers.com. Visit http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.
RE: Is my beloved tool withering on the vine?
If you're keen to go back to school - try learning structured writing - FM is just the tool to start with doing that if you're already familiar with it. From: framers-boun...@lists.frameusers.com on behalf of K Grace Sent: November-21-13 9:26 PM To: framers@lists.frameusers.com Subject: Is my beloved tool withering on the vine? I have been a user of Framemaker since version 5.0time flies. I would like to get feedback from the group to see what your thoughts are regarding the tool. I actually use Framemaker with both PatternStream and Mif2go. Given this tool set I am wondering if new tools like AuthorIt and Flare are worthy replacements. Is it time for me to go back to school and learn yet another tool? My use of frame maker is primarily for the creation and management of polices, procedures, training documents for multiple facilities. There has been a big push to get out documents standardized as much as possible. Any feedback would be appreciated. Grace ___ You are currently subscribed to framers as arch...@mail-archive.com. Send list messages to framers@lists.frameusers.com. To unsubscribe send a blank email to framers-unsubscr...@lists.frameusers.com or visit http://lists.frameusers.com/mailman/options/framers/archive%40mail-archive.com Send administrative questions to listad...@frameusers.com. Visit http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.
RE: Is my beloved tool withering on the vine?
Grace wrote: I have been a user of Framemaker since version 5.0..time flies. I would like to get feedback from the group to see what your thoughts are regarding the tool. I actually use Framemaker with both PatternStream and Mif2go. Given this tool set I am wondering if new tools like AuthorIt and Flare are worthy replacements. Is it time for me to go back to school and learn yet another tool? My use of frame maker is primarily for the creation and management of polices, procedures, training documents for multiple facilities. There has been a big push to get out documents standardized as much as possible. Any feedback would be appreciated. In my opinion FrameMaker isn't 'withering on the vine'. It's better than ever (barring some problems with the user interface) and it's still in active development. If it meets your needs, I wouldn't change a thing. If reuse of content between documents is a requirement, you may run into Frame's limitations. If you reuse small blocks of text via text insets, cross-referencing to those insets is a problem. If you use conditional text, there comes a point where the conditions are no longer manageable. If FrameMaker's reuse options no longer meet your needs, Author-it (and Flare presumably, although I've no experience with it) is a possible replacement. By putting content fragments in a database, Author-it allows fine-grained reuse of sections, paragraphs or individual sentences. Kind regards, Harro de Jong Triview Technical Communication disclaimer: we're an Author-it reseller ___ You are currently subscribed to framers as arch...@mail-archive.com. Send list messages to framers@lists.frameusers.com. To unsubscribe send a blank email to framers-unsubscr...@lists.frameusers.com or visit http://lists.frameusers.com/mailman/options/framers/archive%40mail-archive.com Send administrative questions to listad...@frameusers.com. Visit http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.
Re: Is my beloved tool withering on the vine?
Unless there are some specific areas where FrameMaker is falling short and not meeting your requirements, there's no reason to change tools. They all have strengths and weaknesses. If you're setting up systems for clients and recommending that they buy FrameMaker, Author-It's not as venerable as FrameMaker, but it has been around since 1996. Flare's original development team was mostly the former RoboHelp team, so in a sense it dates back to the 90s as well, though they started from scratch with a completely new code base in 2005. On Thu, Nov 21, 2013 at 6:26 PM, K Grace kgrace4...@aol.com wrote: I have been a user of Framemaker since version 5.0….time flies. I would like to get feedback from the group to see what your thoughts are regarding the tool. I actually use Framemaker with both PatternStream and Mif2go. Given this tool set I am wondering if new tools like AuthorIt and Flare are worthy replacements. Is it time for me to go back to school and learn yet another tool? My use of frame maker is primarily for the creation and management of polices, procedures, training documents for multiple facilities. There has been a big push to get out documents standardized as much as possible. Any feedback would be appreciated. Grace ___ You are currently subscribed to framers as rob...@lauriston.com. Send list messages to framers@lists.frameusers.com. To unsubscribe send a blank email to framers-unsubscr...@lists.frameusers.com or visit http://lists.frameusers.com/mailman/options/framers/robert%40lauriston.com Send administrative questions to listad...@frameusers.com. Visit http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info. ___ You are currently subscribed to framers as arch...@mail-archive.com. Send list messages to framers@lists.frameusers.com. To unsubscribe send a blank email to framers-unsubscr...@lists.frameusers.com or visit http://lists.frameusers.com/mailman/options/framers/archive%40mail-archive.com Send administrative questions to listad...@frameusers.com. Visit http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.
