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Participating Frequently
September 28, 2008
Question

Upgrading from FrameMaker 7 to 8

  • September 28, 2008
  • 12 replies
  • 1372 views
Hi all,
I'm the one that posted the topic http://www.adobeforums.com/webx/.59b6575e/0 but seems that noone has a good answer to the problem.

To recap, it's a problem about FrameMaker 7 + FDK 7 + Distiller 5 (i.e. there's an external C++ program that calls the FrameMaker and comands it via FDK). The problem is about saving as PDF, that eventually causes FM to crash (same book, same conditionals -> always crash).

At this point I'm considering to switch to FM 8, FDK 8 and a compatibile Distiller (???) but I don't know how painful that could be.

Does anyone know if:
- books written into FM 7 have to be converted to be used with FM 8
- books written into FM 7 looks the same when printed with FM 8
- the FDK 7's API are compatible with the FDK 8's
- there are overall consideration to be made prior to embark in switching between 7 and 8

Any advice is appreciated, either about solving/inspecting the FM 7 crash, either about the upgrade from 7 to 8.

Thanks for your work,
n3u.
    This topic has been closed for replies.

    12 replies

    _n3u_Author
    Participating Frequently
    September 28, 2008
    Hi again!

    I downloaded the FM8 trial and gave it a try. Nothing changed, it still crashes, but I didn't recompile with the new FDK8, so if the problem is in the FDK7 API it continues to affect my application.

    I'll manage to get a VC2005 and to try a re-compilation, with FM8 and FDK8.

    Do you know if the new FDK8 dropped support for the old FDK7 APIs call format? I hope this has a chance of success without the need to change the application code, do you think it has?

    Please, any hint is appreciated!
    Thanks,
    n3u.
    Participating Frequently
    September 28, 2008
    I just added a note to your earlier posting .. I think that you need to resolve your problems there before trying to migrate to FM8 .. most likely you'll see the same error in FM8.

    To answer your questions ..
    - yes, FM7 books/files can be opened in FM8 without problems
    - yes, FM7 books/files should look the same when printed from FM8
    - you *may* be able to compile your FDK7 API with the FDK8 libraries .. in general it works, but you may need to make some tweaks. The bigger issue will be problems that arise from the compiler version .. FDK8 requires that you use VS 2005. However, you should be able to load your FDK7 DLLs directly in FM8 without recompiling .. in general, this can be done without problems. The main reason to recompile using the new libraries is if you want to take advantage of new features (such as Unicode).

    You can download the FM8 trial and give it a whirl. But .. I do think that you'll need to resolve the fundamental reason for the crash before it'll work in FM8 .. unless it was an actual bug that was fixed in FM8.

    ...scott