Seeking inputs on desired features in FrameMaker

[Reng, Dr. Winfried]

Hi Kapil,

My wishlist is below. I hope it's not too late.
I use many scripts for most of the issues below. But
FrameMaker should be able to do this without external
help.

Best regards

Winfried

---

H Stability
Stability, no crashes, reliability are my highest priority!

H Vertical alignment
Vertical alignment of paragraphs in text frames (main text frame
or text frames in anchored frames): top, centered, bottom.
Often needed for labels in anchored frames with graphics.

H Search/replace with regular expressions
I want to use regular expressions not only for search but also for replacement.
I would often need this for processing old documents.

H Consistent naming of formats in different user interface languages
Consistent naming of formats in different languages of the FrameMaker
user interface. E.g. paragraph formats for table of contents and index,
reference page names, master pages etc. Currently these are different
in different languages of the FrameMaker user interface and cause
problems (or at least work-arounds) when the German or the international
FrameMaker is used.

H Options to scale graphics
itl offers many good scripts, but this is the best:
http://www.i-frame.itl.info/en/feature-description/i-frame-modules/base-pack/scale-graphics-proportionally.html

H More options to maintain templates in the long run
Template maintenance is very important and gets often ignored. Here options
are missing like importing a single format into other files of a book, replacing
single formats with other formats in all files of a book, deleting single formats
in all files of a book etc. In my oppinion this is very important when using
FrameMaker for years.

H Variables in automatic paragraph numbering
I want to use variables in automatic paragraph numbering. This would
make translations and a common layout much easier.

M Import of formats
During the import it's not always clear, what gets imported. Rick Quatro's
Format Special plugin should be standard.

M Variables to be used in file info
The content of file info can be converted to properties in the PDF.
I want to use variables to populate the dialog. Otherwise this file info
dialog tends to get forgotten. Additionally the fields in this dialog do
not match exactly the corresponding fields in Adobe Reader.

M User dictionary should be language specific
The user dictionary holds the specific spelling of words independant of
the language. I want to have a separate dictionary for each language.
Additionally I want to be able to store more than 300 entries. (I do not
know, if this is still the current limit.)

M Boolean expressions for conditions
Often this does not work reliably. Expressions get too complicated very fast.
There must be brackets. And this must be explained better in the documentation.

> ---
> 
> Hello Framers,
> 
> Hope you are well. In case you don't know me, I am the product manager for
> FrameMaker and am reaching out to seek your inputs into FrameMaker
> product.
> 
> We do monitor the user forums to seek feedback and make improvements
> to the product. As part of the product planning process, I would like to
> request your wishlist for FrameMaker. Please do let us know by submitting
> (not more than 10 :-)) new features and enhancement requests, that you
> would like to see in the product. Also, please indicate a short description of
> the feature request, the need for it and your priority for each request (H-M-L
> would be sufficient). Lastly, please include your email address so that we can
> reach out to you if we have any questions on your requests.
> 
> We would really appreciate it. Thanks in advance for your valuable inputs.
> 
> P.S. I do realize that some of you may have submitted similar feature
> requests in the past. Although, we would have taken a note of your previous
> requests, we want to ensure that the feature request is still relevant and
> important to you and your organization in the current world. So, I would
> request you to please resubmit your prioritized wishlist. apologies for the
> extra time, it may result for you.
> 
> Regards,
> Kapil Verma
> Sr. Product Manager - FrameMaker and FrameMaker Server