Just how hard is it to learn FrameMaker?

Speaking as an almost complete FrameMaker n00b (I worked with PageMaker years ago), I've found it fairly easy, actually.  It's a challenge switching mental frame-sets from, say, Word, but that's because Frame is built on a different set of assumptions.  User control in Frame is much more granular than Word because it's assumed that you want that level of control--like the difference between driving a stick shift and driving an automatic.  If you're experienced with InDesign, it should be fairly simple.

I had some comments that might be useful, but posting more than a couple of sentences is throwing an error I've not seen before:

Please try again later.m5

Not hard at all, because even I was able to learn it, by myself. ;-)

But, joking aside, I can teach you the FrameMaker Basics in two days, and it may be even less if you are highly experienced with InDesign/Pagemaker.

Adobe has some Getting Started Tutorials too:

http://tv.adobe.com/product/framemaker/episode/recently-added/

Cheers

Yves Barbion

Adobe-Certified FrameMaker Instructor

www.scripto.nu

Some of it's a question of mind-set – if you're an experienced InDesign user, then you've already grasped the concepts of styles and page templates. My minimal experience (based on CS5 and FM 10) is that FM offers more for most documents unless you need really fancy lay-out … so the tricky bit (as usual) is working out where product A hides its equivalent for a command in product B; and the fun bit is discovering an idea in product A you'd never even thought of in years of getting to know product B.

The writing skills you bring to the interview are probably more important than the tools skills, imho. As long as you understand how to arrange different bits/types of information and how to make the presentation support the relationship between them, it shouldn't take long for you to add the basics of FM to your toolset. Learning the finer points takes practice, of course, but this forum is a good place for hints and tips.