Learning curve for FrameMaker

[Steve Rickaby]

At 11:00 -0400 29/4/08, Lester C. Smalley wrote:

>If you can find a copy of FrameMaker 5 (e-bay, Craig's List, etc.) buy
>it for the manual; I still have the book (approx 700 pages) and it
>clearly explains a great deal of how Frame works: lots of info about
>master pages; reference pages; generating and formatting Tables of
>Contents, Indices, Lists of ....  Of course, features added later won't
>be covered, but the background understanding this provides is fantastic.

Lester omits to mention what will be known to many here  - that the Frame 5 manual was the last to be produced by the tech authors at Frame Corp. I have a copy, and yes, it is a lot better than the current offering (although I've not seen a FrameMaker 8 manual.)

FrameMaker is a big, big application, and like others such as as Photoshop and Illustrator, can take a long time to master. It is certainly an application for which it is worth spending money on training material, which should give you the advantage of learning to do things correctly from day 1. I speak from experience: I first used FrameMaker in '91 and I learned by muddling through: I did it wrong.

Come to think of it, I think I've still got a set of FrameMaker 3 manuals in the loft, and from memory that ran to several volumes...

-- 
Steve