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Using Conversion Templates |
In addition to modifying the content of your single-source document, you will almost always want to change the presentation a bit. If you have followed the rule of using styles consistently, and have eschewed overrides, your task is a simple one. Even better, you only need to do it once for each target format, not every time you produce a new target document. You do it by making a FrameMaker "conversion template" for your documents. This template document (which is just a regular FrameMaker document itself) contains all the paragraph, character, table, and cross-reference styles used in your source documents, redefined to use the properties you want for the target document. (If a style is unchanged, it need not be included.) For example, suppose you have Print and WinHelp as targets. Your regular document templates are set up as needed for Print use, so you only need a conversion template for WinHelp. What will be different? Consider character styles. If you use underlining for emphasis, you will want to choose another font property to use instead, such as boldness; in WinHelp underlines identify links, and users will be confused if they are used for any other purpose. Look at your paragraph styles. While large changes in type size for different head levels look good on the printed page, they look funny in WinHelp, where you only see one topic heading at a time; you’ll want to decrease most head sizes to work in a smaller range. You’ll also want to get rid of consistent left indents, which only waste screen real estate; the same idea holds for table styles. And for cross-reference styles, strip out the <$pagenum> references and their related words (but leave the style names alone!). Check your color definitions; if used at all, they must match one of the Windows 16 colors, or they will turn to black in WinHelp. And set your Conditions up to show the HelpOnly items and hide PrintOnly. Now comes the best part. With Mif2Go, all you do is put the name of the conversion template in the .ini file, with a setting that tells the filter to use it. Then when you run the conversion, the filter automatically saves your .fm file, imports the filter formats, updates references, saves as .mif for the conversion module, and then reverts to the saved .fm file. The net effect? Your template changes are put into effect without altering your original source files in any way! With Framemaker, you have the control over variations in content (with Conditional Text) and formatting (with Import Formats) that you need to do effective single-sourcing. When you add Mif2Go (with Conversion Templates) to Framemaker, you have a tool that supports your single-sourcing with speed and style. | ||||
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