[Framers] Questions re upgrading Frame from 7.1

Tue Mar 31 07:03:29 PDT 2020

Yup, long post alright!
I would suggest that you find a non-production machine and install a trial copy of FM2019 - make sure you immediately perform updates on it (just because you just downloaded it, doesn't mean that it's up to date - it's like version 1.0 - there's been 5 patches so far). The good news is that you only have to do Help > Updates once, because FM patches are now cumulative, rather than sequential (yay!)
Next, bring over a copy of your FM7.1 content & give upgrading it a try. Since I can't recall when FM went through the Unicode barrier thing, you may find your fonts to be an issue. The UI will be completely different to you. Just play around and experiment.

________________________________
From: Framers <framers-bounces+jeff.coatsworth=jonasclub.com at lists.frameusers.com> on behalf of Wendy McGovern <wmcgovern at pbi.org>
Sent: March 31, 2020 8:01 AM
To: framers at lists.frameusers.com
Cc: publications
Subject: [Framers] Questions re upgrading Frame from 7.1

Hi, Framers,
Apologies for a somewhat long post, but I would really like some input. We are contemplating finally upgrading from our Frame 7.1 (yep, had it for 17 years) to the newest version (Frame 2019). Our version of Frame has been ridiculously stable and its amazing features have served our purposes without having to upgrade over the years. We upgraded our computers to Windows 10 last year, but the 32-bit Frame has worked in that system so far. We do get messages about fonts changing when we change print driver to Adobe for making PDFs, but it hasn't had any ill effects for us. Some background:
We do legal books in Frame that use the generated files feature for summary and tables of contents, tables of cases, tables of statutes, and subject matter indexes. Most of our books have extensive footnotes (lawyers love to include footnotes that go on for 7/8ths of a page). We make PDFs of the books as well as send MIF files to a conversion company for EPUBs. We use unstructured Frame and don't need structure for anything. We don't use conditional text for anything. Recently, I had an incidence of Frame files in a book I was working on get corrupted where paragraphs had been bizarrely messed up and lost the work I had done on the files in the last week or so. Another coworker had saved a Frame file to RTF and later couldn't open the Frame file again because it said it didn't recognize the file format. This is leading us to believe that maybe it is finally time for us to bite the bullet and upgrade to be compatible with all the other software out there now. So, some specific questio
 ns (keeping in mind the unstructured environment):
1. I was going to ask if Frame 2019 allows the old Escape key sequences of Esc-jj and Esc-cc to work, because I saw on the list that they broke those functions in the later versions-but I see from the Frame 2019 manual online that they have restored those functions in 2019. So this functionality works well now?
2. Is Frame ever going to fix the footnotes problem? I've replied to Adobe's feature requests over the years, and they still don't have a fix.
3. Is Frame 2019 stable as far as people using it now can tell? (I've seen some posts here about problems creating PDFs and other things that shouldn't be happening with recent versions of Frame.)
4. There was a small problem with Frame 7.1's ability to use the scroll wheel that needed a special mouse driver that we had to use and we had to reinstall it when we went to Windows 10, but once the driver was in place, it was fixed. I'm assuming Frame 2019 doesn't have any issues like this anymore, right?
5. Another minor problem with our Frame is a glitch where if you hold down the mouse a little too long when selecting something, Frame will crash. Has anyone had this happen with the latest version?
6. Is IXGEN available for the latest Frame?
7. Is Frame to RTF conversion good? We save Frame files to RTF to send to authors for updating their chapters. (People would always need an explanation of why we used the RTF Japanese for the setting.)
8. How do you open old Frame 7 files if you have Frame 2019? The online manual for 2019 says you have to open Frame 7 files as MIF. But in order to change them to MIF, don't you have to convert them from within Frame 7? Can you choose to open them as MIF from 2019 itself? And what about the .book file? Is that preserved if you open all its enclosed files in MIF, or is it an option to save a whole old book as MIF so that generated files are also converted? Would we have to convert all our Frame 7 books to MIF before installing Frame 2019 (or can you have both versions of Frame installed on your computer at the same time?)? And do you have to replace fonts for Unicode ones?
9. Now that Frame has EPUB format as an output, is it good? Is the unstructured version capable of it? Does it involve cleanup to make the EPUB presentable? Are all the links in the Frame file preserved in the EPUB?
10. Finally, what do people think of the subscription model versus buying an outright license (if Adobe even still lets people buy a "forever" license)? I think I remember seeing some panicked user on the list mentioning something about Adobe screwing up their subscription and them not having their Frame functionable anymore.
11. And another finally, seeing some recent posts about problems someone had with the trial version, is there any advice about that?

I am on the digest, so if anyone replies, could you please reply to me directly as well as the list? Thanks for any advice you can give.

[Pennsylvania Bar Institute]<http://www.pbi.org>

Wendy McGovern
Publications Editor
Pennsylvania Bar Institute
5080 Ritter Rd, Mechanicsburg, PA 17055
(E) wmcgovern at pbi.org<mailto:wmcgovern at pbi.org>  (P) 717-620-6257
(P) 800-932-4637, ext. 6257  (F) 717-796-2348
www.pbi.org<http://www.pbi.org>

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