How does working with structured Frame differ from regular Frame?(LONG)

[Etzel, Gary]

Hey Wendy, hello from a fellow Mechanicsburg, PA framer! My general
summary on structure is that it takes a lot of time and planning to set
up, but once it is set up, it's much easier to use than unstructured
Frame. I'll second what Scott said, you have to know that you're doing
it for the right reason. So it's great that you're asking so many
questions. If your superiors have clear goals in mind, that's great. But
if this request is just because XML is trendy right now and they don't
really know what they want to achieve, that could easily lead you down
the wrong road. If you do go down this road, I'd encourage you to do it
yourself, or at least learn about it as much as you can along the way.
You want to be the owner of all this knowledge so you can be
self-dependent and not have to rely on others to always be telling you
what to do and how to do it.

A couple quick notes on other things you said:

- It's easy to convert content to structured FrameMaker, provided that
the original content is consistently formatted in some way. If someone
sends you a Word document that strictly follows a template and uses
consistent styles, you can convert that very easily by mapping Word
styles to FrameMaker elements. However, if the Word source does not use
styles, it's going to take a lot of time.

- You can do manual workarounds in structure, but the point of structure
is to not have that kind of stuff. Maybe you can refine your process in
that regard, and maybe not. But manual overrides of any type are
generally frowned upon when you're using structure.

- I've found it easier to train people who have never used FrameMaker to
use structured Frame than unstructured Frame. As I'm sure you already
know, you're not going to find a whole lot of people in south-central PA
with FrameMaker experience, anyway. So I just worry about the other
skills I need, and not waste time looking for FrameMaker on the resume.

One final note, we have a small STC chapter here in Harrisburg with a
couple of real structure junkies in the membership, myself included.
We've always invited non-STC members to attend our chapter events, so if
you were interested, I'd be glad to put you on the mailing list.

Regards,

Gary



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