[Closed] FrameMaker 7.x/8 Feature Requests

Sorry for going off topic.

Ronald, check out this article, which remphasizes all your points about FM marketing (an excellent review):

http://www.designer-info.com/DTP/framemaker.htm

There's three things I want to see, finally:
a) WYSIWYG: anyone who's ever used FM under NeXTSTEP with DisplayPostScript and who as seen the razor-sharp rendering of EPS, graphics, Type1 type, etc. just has a puke-reflex each time he must use a product that is now five major releases more advanced and still can't do what it could do with release 2 under NeXTSTEP.
b) Mac OS X native, with full support of EPS and PDF display. No lousy preview bitmap junk, please!

c) Finally start selling FM as a powerful word processor. I always used, and continue to use FM as a better replacement for MS-Word, less so as a publishing system. The text processing in FM runs circles around what MS-Word can do, and the clear separation between content and representation is what any logically thinking writer wants.
With a few style sheets this can be a screewriting package, a scientific word processor, a tool to enforce Corporate Identity, by allowing secretaries to only write business documents in pre-defined FM templates, etc.
One simply doesn't have to be professionally in the publishing business to have good use for this package, and Adobe's marketing totally neglects this.

[In respose to item 1 of posting 133 in this thread]

To remove all change bars in all files in a book select all the files in the book window then go to format>document>change bars.

Warning whenever a text deletion involves markers of any type.

This could reduce unresolved cross-references and shrinking indexes.

I vote for this one! I hate turning on View>Text Symbols, and, depending on how many markers you end up with in a heading, it can be hard to put them all at the beginning or end of the paragraph.

Offer Frame as part of a suite like Adobe's Web, Design and Publishing Collections. This may get Frame into the hands of more small businesses.

I have been mentioning this for a few years now. I think it'd be a great idea to have a robust publishing package. I'd even suggested they partner with Quadralay on the deal and incorporate WWP Pro in the mix for Help Authoring...

Here is my list. I will try not to repeat other suggestions:
- Better tools for resolving unresolved cross-references.
- Warning whenever a text deletion involves markers of any type. This could reduce unresolved cross-references and shrinking indexes.
- Fit to anchored frame option for imported graphics.
- Make alternative bullets easier to get. My students want to kill me whenever I show them how.
- Allow master pages in different page sizes within same fm file. This would help foldouts within a chapter
- Prompt when referenced graphics have been updated similar to InDesign so that you can choose whether to update the graphic that appears in the frame doc.
- Continue to find ways to make FrameMaker integrate better with other Adobe products and interface. I am always amazed at how easy it was to learn InDesign and how similar it was and easily it integrates with other Adobe products. I know that Adobe has probably worked pretty hard at this already, but keep up the great work.
- Offer Frame as part of a suite like Adobe's Web, Design and Publishing Collections. This may get Frame into the hands of more small businesses.
- I agree with other posts, need to be able to lock down certain template features without resorting to structured Frame.
- Easy way to find and remove format over rides.
- Allow frame borders to look more like the ones in InDesign, ie. change the colour to something else like light blue (this is a would be nice request)
- Make developing structured applications easier in Structured Frame. With the now unified product and roundtrip XML capability, a lot of businesses would like to go in this direction but lack the time and expertise to undertake this.

Otherwise, it's a great product that does what's promised.

I would hate to do without the warnings...

? It is imperative that I see that I have unresolved cross-references.

Do away with the screen that appears when you have unresolved cross-references. I've never figured how to use it, but Ctrl-F Unresolved... works well enough.

1) Removal of all change bars in all files in a book.

2) Fitting of embedded graphics to their anchored frames.

3) User-defined adding/removal of toolbar items from menus (toolbar maintenance using add/remove).

4) Export/Import book to/from RTF/Word (with graphics and preserved formating).