mif2go questions and requests

[Jeremy H. Griffith]

On Sat, 26 Jan 2013 18:43:12 -0800, Richard Man <richard at imagecraft.com> wrote:

>Hi, I just moved our doc/help from FM7/Webworks to FM11 and I need a Help
>file solution. Since ePbulisher (evolved from webworks) is $$$ and doesn't
>open the old project files, I am now looking at alternatives and mif2go
>looks good.

Thanks!

>I installed and the demo and found a couple issues. I am using the OmniHelp
>output format. I have "MIF wash" all the files.
>
>- I have a piece text with mailto: hypertext marker, e.g.
>
>   This is some text support at imagecraft.com more text here.
>
>support at imagecraft.com has the hypertext marker "mailto:
>support at imagecraft.com". It looks good on Frame, on the ODF out put and
>also with Webworks. However, mif2go somehow generated the ahref from the
>beginning of the text, something like
>
>    <ahref ...mailto:support at imagecraft.com This is some text...
>
>rather than just the email address, so the whole line is underlined and
>become part of the hyperlink.

Do you have a char format around the hypertext marker and the
text you want for the link?  Sounds like you don't, or perhaps
the marker is outside the char format span (easy to do).  See
User's Guide par. 5.9, "Creating hotspots for hypertext links".

>- Under FM11, Find->Unresolved Cross Reference does not show any issues,
>but after mif2go, some hyperlinks are definitely not working, although some
>are.

What does the "Check Links" report show?  See User's Guide
par. 5.1.5, "Checking for broken links in HTML or XML output".
IIRC, Frame's Find doesn't check hyperlinks, just xrefs.  The
two are very different.

>****************
>I am assuming that these and others are likely pilot errors. Since I am
>really a programmer and not a tech writer, if anyone can help to get me up
>and running, I'd appreciate it. I am quite technical competent (I write C
>compilers for a living) so I don't expect it will take more than an hour,
>and probably less. Just let me know your rate.

Um, that would be "free".  We do ask that people consult 
the 1200-page User's Guide first, which has an excellent
Index; my own role often feels like "automated index".  ;-)
There's also an Appendix D, "Technical support for Mif2Go",
which explains in detail just what we need to find a bug.

>Our doc is fairly straight forward, a couple FM11 books sharing some
>chapters, and the chapters contain conditional text. If you send me an
>email, I will send you description of our set up and what I need to get
>done.

Doesn't sound like you should expect any serious problems.
FM 11 is, well, FM 11.  I don't use it myself; I prefer 8
for productive work, and the FM 9+ UI is not for those with 
any visual challenges.  But we have lots of customers using
it without incident.

HTH!


-- Jeremy H. Griffith, at Omni Systems Inc.
  <jeremy at omsys.com>    http://mif2go.com/