Create a list of changes

Linda,

   There's no way to create the change list in one step, but you can get close with a few steps.

  Are your documents structured or unstructured? Below I sketch two techniques you can use with unstructured documents, although the second one uses an intermediate document that is structured.

Changing the paragraph format of paragraphs with changes

The first method assigns a unique paragraph format to paragraphs that contain text marked with change bars. You can then generate a list of those paragraphs. This method will include entire paragraphs, not just the text ranges (words and phrases within the paragraphs) that have been changed. This method does preserve the change bars in the generated list , but loses other formatting, such as autonumbers:

1. Make a backup of your document before you start. Do the following in a scratch copy. The following steps make changes that you do not want to keep.

2. Define a new paragraph format called, say Changed. 

3. In the Find/Change pod, select Character Format from the Find pull-down menu at the top.

4. In the resulting Find Character Format dialog box, type Shift-F8 to set all options to As Is.

5. Check the Change Bar box.

5. Click the Set button in the lower left to dismiss the dialog box.

6. Click Find to find the next content with a change bar.

7. Apply paragraph format Changed. Don't worry about changes to the formatting.

8. Use Edit > Copy Special > Paragraph Format to copy this format to the clipboard.

9. In the Find/Change pod, select By Pasting from the Change pull-down menu.

10. Click Change All.

11. Generate a list of all paragraphs tagged Changed.

Generating a list of changed elements

The second method creates a temporary structured version of the unstructured document and let's you extract only changed phrases rather than the entire containing paragraphs. You must be using the Structured FrameMaker user interface (set in Preferences) to use this method, but everything you need to know about structured documents is included below.

1. Again, make a backup, and work in a temporary version of your document.

2. Create a character format called Changed that turns change bars on.

3. As above, search for a Character Format containing a change bar.

4. Apply Changed to the resulting selection.

5. Use Edit > Copy Special > Character Format to copy Changed to the clipboard.

6. Use Change All to apply this character format to all content with change bars.

7. Use Structure > Utilities > Generate Conversion Table.

8. In the resulting dailog box, select Generate New. A new document should appear, containing a table with one body row. The first cell in this row should contain c:Changed and the sceond cell should contain Changed.

9. Save this file calling it something like ConvTable.fm.

10. Go back to your actual document and use Structure > Utilities > Structure Current Document.

11. Select ConvTable.fm as the conversion table.

12. Click Add Structure. FrameMaker will create a new version of the document which is structured.

13. Save the new document as Structured.fm

14. Generate a list of elements and paragraphs from Structured.fm.

15. The first line in the Do not include shuttle box will be Changed. This entry differs from the following entries because it does not start with a paragraph symbol because Changed is an element tag but the others are paragraph tags. Move Changed to the Include side and any others on the Include side to the Do not include side.

16. Generate the list. Entries will only show the changed text ranges and not the paragraphs that contain them.

    --Lynne

I'm not clear if you are asking how to create a List of Effective Pages—an LEP (or LOEP) is a list of every page in a document along with the current revision number and the date of each page's revision. If so, see https://www.rockymountaintraining.com/adobe-framemaker-how-to-create-a-list-of-effective-pages/.

This sounds more list a list of the words that have changed? FrameMaker can't do that, unless you were to copy the new words into a custom marker as you make the edits, and then generate a list of markers.

~Barb