Applying new templates to existing documents

[LG Lists]

Doug,
 
I've done this type of thing for several clients, though on a slightly
smaller scale. I've used a couple of tools that make the process much more
doable.
 
Here's what I've done:

1.	

	Analyze documents for styles used using the Paragraph Tools and
Character Tools plugins from Silicon Prairie.

I did not look at every single file, but would select a few from each book
and look at what's there. I would print some lists of styles, then check off
or add to until I had all the style names, including paragraph, character,
table, cross reference, variables, and conditions.

2.	

	Map all the styles in use to the new template styles.

I use Rick Quatro's FrameScript (something like FindChangeFormatsBatch). You
just have a table in a Frame file and map the old style to the new style and
say whether to delete the old style. It lets you map all of the styles I
listed above.

These two steps are what take the most time.

3.	

	Test the mapping/conversion by importing the new template into a
copy of the book, running the script, and looking at the results.

4.	

	Adjust the mapping based on the test results.

5.	

	Repeat steps 3 and 4 on a couple of books.

6.	

	Run the script on the "live" books.

This part is amazingly fast!

Voila! You may find some outliers here and there that you missed. If they're
in a bunch of files, you can create a new mapping file for just those few
styles and rerun the script. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Linda G. Gallagher
STC Fellow
TechCom Plus, LLC
lindag at techcomplus dot com
www.techcomplus.com <http://www.techcomplus.com/>  
303-450-9076 or 800-500-3144
Tutorials, "show me" demos, user guides, help, FrameMaker and WebWorks
ePublisher templates
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
RMIMA Secretary
www.RMIMA.org <http://www.rmima.org/>  
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  _____  

From: framers-bounces at lists.frameusers.com
[mailto:framers-bounces at lists.frameusers.com] On Behalf Of edwardsdo
Sent: Tuesday, July 26, 2011 7:30 AM
To: framers at lists.frameusers.com
Subject: Applying new templates to existing documents


My employer has implemented a new corporate-level style guide that impacts
the look and feel of our customer-facing documentation. Source files for
these documents are created/maintained using unstructured FrameMaker 8
running on Windows XP sp 3. 13 writers are updating the majority of our
current documents (group A) by applying templates that use the existing
paragraph/character/table format naming conventions and reflect the new
style requirements. A small group of the documents to be updated (group B)
uses the A4 page size and a set of paragraph/character/table formats that
have completely different naming conventions than those used group A. Group
B includes 50+ documents with a total of 650 source files and just over
10,000 pages. We're considering the options we have for converting the group
B documents to the new style guide requirements.
  
One option is to convert the group B documents to the templates used for the
group A documents, including paragraph/character/table naming conventions
and the letter page size, so that we can move forward with a single,
consistent set of templates for all FM documents. However, this option means
that we must identify all paragraph/character/table names in the group B
documents, rename them with corresponding names from the group A templates,
and then apply the group A templates to each FM file. Definitely a
labor-intensive process unless it can be automated significantly, possibly
with FrameScript. 
 
The other option is to modify the templates currently used for the group B
documents to obtain the needed look and feel, and then reapply those
templates to the group B documents. The conversion effort would be reduced
significantly, but we would still have two sets of FM templates to maintain.


Is there a more efficient way to implement either of the options I have
described? Are there other options for reformatting the group B documents? 
 
Thanks.
 
Doug Edwards


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