Modularised EDDs?

[Scott Prentice]

Frame doesn't complain about invalid structure if it's in an FM binary 
file. You'll see red in the structure view, but that's all .. give it a 
whirl, it works just fine!  :)

...scott


Hedley Finger wrote:
> Martin, Keith, and others:
>
> Yes, Scott's answer is what I was after -- using text insets to build 
> modular EDDs to simplify maintenance and avoid duplicating element 
> substructures and attributes over and over in different locations on 
> the master element tree.  As you point out, provided that a test 
> inset's root element fits nicely under an ancestor in the host 
> document, you can indeed use boilerplate in a document.  However, FM 
> is going to complain about the structure of the text inset source not 
> being conformant to an EDD.  I believe that there may be a way around 
> this but don't know what it is.
>
> Regards,
> Hedley
>
> At Thursday, 28/02/2008, 03:56 AM;, you wrote:
>   
>> Yes .. you can do this, and it works quite well (as long as you 
>> don't get too carried away with the modularization). A FM binary 
>> file can have any element at the root .. it may be "invalid" but it 
>> will open fine and if it's imported into a container EDD will work 
>> fine. Just keep in mind that if you update one of the insets, you do 
>> still need to open the "root" EDD and import that file into the 
>> template. Using this technique along with variables to define chunks 
>> of the EDD is a good approach for EDD maintenance.
>> Note that this is how the structapp stub files have been implemented 
>> in DITA-FMx .. the stub files themselves are invalid, but when 
>> imported as an inset into the structapps file, work fine.
>> Cheers,
>> Scott Prentice
>> Leximation, Inc.
>> www.leximation.com
>> +1.415.485.1892
>>
>>
>> Hedley Finger wrote:
>>     
>>> Lynne Price, Kay Whatley and others:
>>>
>>> The DITA DTDs are modularised to allow ready re-use, specialisation 
>>> and maintenance.
>>>
>>> Is there any way to create a modularised EDD, with a skeleton host 
>>> file and modules imported as text insets?  I have been studying the 
>>> Adobe documentation for developing structured applications but 
>>> cannot find any reference to using text insets in this way.  I read 
>>> somewhere a couple of years ago that EDD fragments always require a 
>>> root element that matches an element in the main host EDD skeleton, 
>>> which would rather undermine this idea.  But perhaps there is a 
>>> special root element that can map onto ANY element in the host EDD 
>>> -- a new feature in FM8?
>>>
>>> It seems to me that both the Adobe and Leximation EDDs could 
>>> benefit from modularisation that exactly maps onto the *.dtd and 
>>> *.mod files of the DITA schemas/DTDs.
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>> Hedley
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Hedley Stewart Finger
>>> 28 Regent Street   Camberwell VIC 3124   Australia
>>> Tel. +61 3 9809 1229   Mobile +61 412 461 558,
>>> E-mail <mailto:hfinger at handholding.com.au>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>       
>> --
>> Hedley Stewart Finger
>> 28 Regent Street   Camberwell VIC 3124   Australia
>> Tel. +61 3 9809 1229   Mobile +61 412 461 558,
>> E-mail <mailto:hfinger at handholding.com.au>
>>     
>
>
>