Elements default format appear as blocks instead of inline text

Report · Jul 06, 2012

I am creating an EDD and I have some issues with the way FrameMaker breaks each element instead of leaving it inline. This wouldn't be a problem if I was allowed to format children instead of elements; then I could fix the problems I am having.

Short question is, is there a way to tell FrameMaker to open unformatted elements inline instead of as blocks?

For instance, I have acronym elements within the text that wrap the definition and then wrap the term. When formatting it, it must show up as text and then the acronym after it with parentheses around it. I was able to make that happen by using run-ins, but the acronym element itself is no longer a part of the para. It is broken down to its own paragraph.

Example: <para>Reference will be made to the <acronym><def>Air Force</def><term>AF</term></acronym> serial number.</para>

should look like this:

Reference will be made to the Air Force (AF) serial number.

but instead looks like this:

Reference will be made to the

Air Force (AF) serial number.

because I can't edit the EDD to have any para element with an acronym within it to format as a run-in.

Report · Jul 09, 2012

Hi,

I'm having trouble understanding exactly what you are asking for. It is a simple EDD rule to make an element render as in-line. There does not need to be any other formatting specified. Here is a rough paste of the EDD setup:

Text format rules

In all contexts.

Text range.

Are you saying that you can't edit the EDD because you are not allowed, or that you don't know how? If you cannot edit the EDD, you can't get the in-line formating that you desire, because that's where the rules are. So, adjustment of the EDD is your only option.

Russ

Report · Jul 09, 2012

I guess "can't" was the wrong choice of word; I meant, the EDD does not allow (as far as I've seen) any way to control a child element, only parents & ancestors. Am I wrong about this?

I also have <acronym> as a text range and it does not appear inline; it is still blocked as a paragraph.

Thank you for your response.

Report · Jul 09, 2012

Hi,

I think you are wrong about something, but I'm not entirely sure what it is yet I don't think it is conceptually accurate to say "control a child element" or even "control parents & ancestors." Every element in an EDD has zero or more rules that control its own formatting, sometimes based on hierarchy (ie, parents and ancestors), but no element format rules control the formatting of any other element. All format rules control the respective element only.

So, I'm not quite clear why you can't just add the "text range" rule to the <acronym> element. It would happily live inline if you did. If it needs to be inline in some cases but not others, you could add context rules (based on ancestry, attribute values, etc) to control that.

I'm still not sure that I'm getting to the root of your question here so please feel free to comment further.

Russ

Report · Jul 09, 2012

Oh, I have no doubt I am wrong about something!

I've been working with FrameMaker for many years, but this is the

first time I've had to use it to get printed output from XML, so while

I know DTDs and FrameMaker formatting, I'm a total noob on EDDs.

I did finally get it to work using context rules on is one of them.

Its children come in, but their parent is just not there.

To make it more clear what I am doing, here's the fat:

I have valid XML that I have converted from SGML (including the DTD)

and authored in Arbortext. I work for the DoD and they don't have the

funds to develop a FOSI for output from Arbortext, but they have

plenty of licenses for FrameMaker, so I am having to take the XML and

bring it into FrameMaker just to get a PDF.

I haven't even begun to grasp how I'm going to work out building the

LEP, TOC, LOI, LOT, and Indices yet. I know the build can be done

manually, because I've done it and have templates for that already

(although they are about ten years old).

But my goal here (hahaha) is to "simply open the XML and print"

without having to do anything manually.

Report · Jul 10, 2012

With some effort to surmount the learning curve, there should be no reason that you can't "simply open the XML and print." This capability is one of FM's great strengths and is often less complex than FO-based publishing solutions.

I still don't understand what this statement means:

Its children come in, but their parent is just not there.

...but I'm gathering that you have solved the original problem, yes?

Russ

Report · Jul 10, 2012

Yes, I've solved the original problem 😉 thank you.

Regarding the children without parents, the parent is there in the structure view but when typing down through the page view to make sure paragraph tags were placed correctly, some don't appear.

Thanks for all your help!

Report · Jul 10, 2012

If you have solved the problem, fine; but let me clarify a few things:

Example: <para>Reference will be made to the <acronym><def>Air Force</def><term>AF</term></acronym> serial number.</para>
I also have <acronym> as a text range and it does not appear inline; it is still blocked as a paragraph.

The FrameMaker EDD rules assume every element is to be formatted as a paragraph unless you tell it otherwise. Giving the acronym element text range formatting (inline) is not enough; you must also set def and term elements to be text range. This is a little bit of a guess on my part, because I have never tried putting paragraph-formatted elements inside a text-range-formatted element.

Regarding the children without parents, the parent is there in the structure view but when typing down through the page view to make sure paragraph tags were placed correctly, some don't appear.

This is still not clear; every element (except the document root element) must have a parent; othewise, the structure is invalid. You see the parent in the structure view, so the parent IS there.

Not every element has to have a paragraph tag associated with it. The typical examples are elements that serve no formatting purpose but simply contain other elements. For example, suppose you have a chapter that has several sections. Each section may have a title element and several paragraph elements. The title element and the paragraph elements are formatted as paragraphs, each with a paragraph tag (if the EDD assigns paragraph tags). The containing section element does not have a paragraph tag; it simply contains the title and paragraph elements.

NOTE that the EDD can assign formatting without assigning a paragraph tag. Maybe this is the cause of your concern. If your EDD is doing this, then some elements will not have tags, even thought the formatting is correct. {CAVEAT: My EDD assigns a default format list to the root element in a document. Except for a very few elements, all formatting is done as overrides to the default tag. In my case, each element displays the same tag, the default tag. I am not sure what happens when NO tag is assigned as the default.}}

I haven't even begun to grasp how I'm going to work out building the
LEP, TOC, LOI, LOT, and Indices yet. I know the build can be done
manually, because I've done it and have templates for that already
(although they are about ten years old).

You likely need not do these lists manually. In a structured document or book, you can create these lists either as lists of paragraph tags (as one does in unstructured documents) or as lists of elements (for example, an LOT is a list of Table elements, if Table is the name of your table element). The elements in the list need not have paragraph tags in the document; typically they do not. See the FrameMaker user manual for details.

Van