FM crashes on print book to file (surprise! No?)

[Bodvar Bjorgvinsson]

I am starting to get annoyed with FrameMaker. (Sorry for a lengthy message).

On a few occasions I have plagued the list with my complaints about FM
(mainly 7.2) crashing on printing a book to ps. I have now spent half
the day trying to produce an online PDF with bookmarks. No problem
printing to ps without bookmarks, so we have that one in the clear.

It started by FM crashing on a certain file (chapter 3) on a specific
page, no matter whether I had the files open or not. Having them open
only added the extra work of removing the recovery files. Having
removed these three times, I went for the closed files printing.

Also I MIF-washed the files but go no better results.

I tested the "offending" file by itself and it printed to file with
bookmarks ok, but printing from the book, it always crashed FM at the
same page.

A couple of pages earlier, around the point where the pdf started to
lack contents seriously (yes, I managed to pdf the ps part, and I also
had a look at the ps in GSView which showed less content), there was a
OLEd Visio file. I found the pdf and eps-ed it and replaced the
graphics. Same result.

I found a Xref marker on the crashing page and deleted it, and now it
went a couple of pages further.

I removed FM 7.2 (plus patch), restarted the PC and installed all (FM
+ patches) again.
No change.

I started a new document, imported the formats and then the contents
and replaced the file. Now it went all the way down to one of the last
chapters, where it crashed again with the same messages. No Xref on
that page, only a table (and this file got a lot of tables).

Now I did as with chapter 3, started a new document, copied etc. and
started the printing again. And what now. Now I got as far as to the
same page in chapter 3 as in the first tries.

I am out of guesses. What can I do? And why cannot FM give any humanly
understandable hints?

For 8.0, why not add internal checkpoints that tells us what exactly
is causing the crashing? It should not be that difficult when the
print process hits an offending item to have the application point
that out. Is there a malfunction in the Xref marker, is the graphic
not kosher, etc.

Any help out there, please? I am going home now. Will check the mail
in the morning.

Bodvar Bjorgvinsson
Supervisor Publishing
Air Atlanta Icelandic.
http://www.airatlanta.com