Hey Hussein, Thanks for the tips - I have read the docs, and I have found the Power Users guide to be a bit *opaque* ; > I will give it another read, as I would like to customize the editor more for the content people (the writers) than for myself (web techie).
I have set up a page with sample files and screen shots to show the situation I had described: http://www.capcollege.bc.ca/test/xml-mind/index.xhtml The screenshots show the steps I went through to open an external glossary that is an entity reference in sample-book.xml (step01 and step02). I open glossary.xml by clicking on the "Edit Referenced Document" icon beside the node bar (step03). I then see the unstyled tree view for glossary.xml (step04). I click on a glossentry to highlight that element, and then I right-click on the node bar to insert another glossentry after it (step05). I then get a glossentry without any access to a text node (step06). The files all validate, and until now (editing glossary), I have been very happy with with XML_Mind's DocBook capabilities. I will try the customization you have suggested, and I hope I'm just missing something basic here... Thanks again for your help, Chris Chris Johnson Web Developer Capilano College 604.986.1911 ext. 3455 cjohnson at capcollege.bc.ca >>> hussein at pixware.fr 12/15/2003 2:38:09 AM >>> Chris Johnson wrote: > > As you recommended in a previous reply, I have downloaded and taken a > look at the XML source for the XML_Mind help files. I'm working on the > index and glossary for my current project, and I have a few questions. > > 1. Marking up a glossary was, well, a bit clunky - I ended up doing it > in a text editor. When I view the glossary as a managed entity > reference, the default styling is easy to interact with. When I edit the > glossary file itself, the tree view is very unwieldy, and when I try to > enter some text for the <glossterm>, the curser focus keeps moving back > to the <para> in the previous <glossterm> element. In other words, > XML_Mind does not let me access the text node of the <glossterm> > element, nor does it allow me to access the text node of the <para> in > the <glossdef>. I cannot reproduce this behavior. Note that the glossary, when included inside the master document (example: a book), cannot be edited at all. You need to open the glossary file as a stand-alone document (using File|Open) in order to be able to edit it. > 2. I couldn't see any <indexterm> elements in any of help files - have > you worked on any docBook projects that required a lot of manual > indexing, and if not, what indexing tool do you use outside of XML_Mind? > I'm looking for examples of *real* documents that have been indexed... See answer below. --- I really don't understand what is happening to you... A few recommendations, just in case: [1] Please take the time to read the tutorial. [2] Please do not use the tree view or an external editor because this is a symptom that you loosing your time with XXE. [3] Make sure that the document you are editing is valid: you should not see a red icon at the bottom left of the window. [4] <glossxxx> elements and <indexterm> elements have no special meaning for XXE. They are styled and edited like any other XML elements. This means: [a] If you have problems with them, you probably have problems with all the other elements. [b] XXE, which is not a DocBook editor (that is, which doesn't know the semantics of DocBook elements), has the following default behavior: When you insert an element, say a <glossentry>, XXE chooses the simplest possible content model, which is for a <glossentry>: --- <glossentry> <glossterm></glossterm> <glosssee></glosssee> </glossentry> --- Of course, this is *very annoying* because common sense would mandate: --- <glossentry> <glossterm></glossterm> <glossdef> <para></para> </glossdef> </glossentry> --- But <glossdef> which contains a <para> is more complex than <glosssee> which just contains a #text. Replacing <glosssee> by <glossdef> is easy to do using command Edit|Replace, but why not automate all this? Edit <XXE_install_dir>/config/docbook/docbook.xxe and add a template for the <glossentry> element: --- <elementTemplate name="with_glossdef" selectable="override"> <glossentry xmlns=""> <glossterm></glossterm> <glossdef> <para></para> </glossdef> </glossentry> </elementTemplate> --- All this is described in the Power User's Guide. See http://www.xmlmind.com/xmleditor/_distrib/docs/poweruser/ar01s04s09.html We can ensure that you can write large DocBook books using XXE Standard Edition, without never having to use the tree view or an external editor, more efficiently than with any other tool, but *not with the bundled DocBook configuration alone*. In order to reach maximum efficiency, you need to tune the DocBook configuration to your taste and habits.
