Books and List of...

[Alison Craig]

FM 9 Version: 9.0p255
Unstructured
OS: XP Pro with SP3
FM Experience: 15 months
Writing Team: 1 (me)

I'm working on an addition to my Service Manual (SM) suite. At the moment, I have one Book with all the same files and I use conditional text and variable files to create two different SMs for four different products (three products share one SM). Currently, I copy in the appropriate Cover file to suit the particular product I am creating at any given time.

At this point, I am adding a series of drawings to the manual(s). These drawings will be created by the Mechanical department (to my specs) in a CAD program and saved as AI files so I can have my way with them. Some drawings will be universal and others will be specific to one of the two SMs. Each drawing will be a separate, single-sided document on 11x17 paper.

I have the template for the Master Page down, I think (many thanks to Rick Quatro) but now I'm trying to figure out the best way to include them in the Book. I thought I'd run my idea by the List before proceeding to make sure I haven't missed any big holes.

My thought is to create two Books as I can't see a way to add a condition to an entire file. All Chapters and Appendices would be exactly the same files (as would the Title Page and TOC), but the Drawings could then be included on a product basis. This way I could also have Cover files relevant to specific products (so I don't have to handle this manually any more).

Does this seem like the most straightforward approach?

I would also like to create a Drawing TOC or List of Drawings to fall after the regular TOC. My first guess is to create the Marker Type "Drawing", then create a List of Drawings based on that Marker Type (I would use the Drawing title as the text for the Marker). Does this make sense, or is there a better way?

Alison

Alison Craig, Technical Writer
Ultrasonix Medical Corporation
Tel: (604) 279-8550, ext 127
E-mail: alison.craig at ultrasonix.com<mailto:alison.craig at ultrasonix.com>