Framemaker 9 vs Microsoft Word

[Dr Rick Smith]

Regarding Frame vs Word, let me explain how I use it: I'm a consultant  
whose vice is book writing. I've been writing books with unstructured  
Frame since version 4. I'm also obliged to use MS Word when writing  
reports for clients.

Rather than list strong points of each, let me list weak points of each:



Weak points of Framemaker

* Hardly anyone uses Frame. There's rarely any point in emailing Frame  
documents to people. Fortunately, both of my publishers have a  
production organization that knows/understands/loves it.

* The vendor doesn't take the product seriously. This is shown through  
lackluster advertising, upgrades, and support. It reminds me of  
Multics under Honeywell, for the oldsters out there.  I'm astonished  
that the program is in as good a shape as it is. I'm always expecting  
another "We're dropping Frame" announcement.

* Since it's not taken seriously, there are rough edges in the user  
interface. Today, even the simplest text editor software understands  
"click and drag." Not Framemaker. When the scroll wheel became a  
common GUI feature a decade ago, Frame required an extra release or  
two before the scroll wheel worked reliably.

* The analytical and statistical tools are weak or nonexistent.  
There's a hokey interface that performs "word count," and that's about  
it. There are no analytics of average sentence complexity or grade  
level. While on one level I'm not confident that an algorithmic  
analysis will provide authoritative answers, I'd like to see how my  
different chapters compare.

* Important features use complicated interfaces that are hard to  
master through pure trial and error. I was initiated into the arcane  
secrets of section numbering by the Wizard Sheldon, who could make  
Framemaker sing soprano. You really need -training- to do advanced  
things like TOCs and indices, either in person or from a clear and  
complete written explanation. I'm only tackling indices this time  
because there's a readable chapter on it in O'Keefe et al's  
"Unstructured Framemaker 8" (and because the publisher isn't doing the  
index himself).

* There's no outlining feature with expand/collapse and a distinction  
between headings and text, like you have in MS Word. While I don't  
find Word's outline feature very effective, it's better than almost  
all 3rd party outliners.



Weak points of MS Word - things that have failed me over the past decade

* If you want a consistent document, you need to put it all in one  
file. Maybe they've fixed that by now, but I've mercifully not had to  
deal with a giant Word document recently.

* If the document gets too big (100+ pages), random things start  
failing. In a previous version, I remember seeing bullet symbols  
randomly disappear from bullet lists when the document reached 100  
pages.

* I can't make cross references work as cleanly and reliably as they  
work in Frame.

* I can't control a figure's location as reliably as I can in Frame.

* I can't make chapter or section or figure or table numbering work as  
cleanly and reliably as it works in Frame.

* I can't change an individual paragraph's format as cleanly as I do  
in Frame. When I try to apply a Word style or a format or whatever to  
a paragraph, I get a bunch of questions about whether I'm trying to  
redefine the style or globally apply this paragraph's format to other  
things, or something else irrelevant.

* I can't reliably make a global change to a paragraph format and  
propagate it to all thusly-formatted paragraphs and do it as easily  
and reliably as I do in Frame.


Over the years I've learned how to fix some of my gripes about Word,  
but the fixes haven't always survived past the next product upgrade.


Rick Smith
Cryptosmith LLC