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pdeitel
Known Participant
January 7, 2020
Question

Replacement for IXGEN Plugin?

  • January 7, 2020
  • 2 replies
  • 950 views

Hi All,

 

I was a long time IXGEN user. Unfortunately, they've retired and it does not work with FrameMaker 2019. 

 

Has anyone found a good replacement tool for bulk processing of index entries? 

 

One of the things I loved about IXGEN was the ability to generate a table of all the book's index entries, then fix them across an entire book. For example, if I had lots of similar entries that were singular, plural or maybe had slight wording differences, I could quickly make them all the same and apply the changes bookwide. 

 

Any pointers would be sincerely appreciated?

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2 replies

LinSims
Community Expert
LinSimsCommunity Expert
Community Expert
January 7, 2020

It works with FrameMaker 2019, but you have to use the 32-bit version of FrameMaker instead of the 64-bit version. Or so Frank told me when I inquired about some of its capabilities back in September. He also said there are 5 DLLs that you will need that Adobe has deleted, so he provides links for them, too.

 

(Edited for clarification and additional information.)

    P
    pdeitelAuthor
    Known Participant
    January 7, 2020

    Hmmm. Where did you find the DLLs from Frank?

    LinSims
    Community Expert
    LinSimsCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    January 7, 2020

    I didn't. He told me that there were 5 DLLs required that Adobe had deleted and that if you bought Ixgen, he would provide links to them.

     

    I have not bought Ixgen. I am using Index Tools Pro from Silicon Prairie. It has nowhere near the functionality of Ixgen (or the major indexing tools), but it works for me for the size documents I'm working on, which run from about 20 pages to a bit over 100. If they got any bigger, I'd have to rethink things because (a) we're not USING 32-bit FrameMaker, and I have a suspicion that the next release will be purely 64-bit, and (b) none of the major indexing programs work with FrameMaker files.

     

    Rick, I stand in awe of your ExtendScript prowess, but replicating the functions of any of those indexing programs will be a major undertaking, even though I think you already have chunks of code that could be adapted for use, such as your Find/Change Formats Batch script. Caveat: I am not a programmer, and I may be very, very wrong about this.

    frameexpert
    Community Expert
    frameexpertCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    January 7, 2020

    I moved all of my plugins to ExtendScript a few years back because of having to recompile for new FrameMaker versions, etc. I could look at providing you the functionality in ExtendScript if you give me some firm specs. If you are interested, please contact me offlist. Thanks. rick at frameexpert dot com.

    www.frameexpert.com
    frameexpert
    Community Expert
    frameexpertCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    January 7, 2020

    If you look at my CrossrefReporter script, you will see that I do something similar with cross-references. In this case, it is just a report, but it could be modified to work with markers and allow updates to FrameMaker.

    http://www.frameexpert.com/store/

    www.frameexpert.com
    P
    pdeitelAuthor
    Known Participant
    January 7, 2020

    Hi Rick, Good to hear from you. I am not prepared to get into custom development--at least not yet. But I will keep this in mind for the future. 

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