Frame Maker document Format conversion to InDesign format

Report · Apr 01, 2011

Frame Maker stores the authored document into binary format. My question is any Adobe Scripting/program guide to read the framemaker data and convert in a format which Adobe InDesign can understand.

I read an article that there is a MIF filter tool which provide such functionality. I love coding than using some prebuilt tool.

Is anyone has experienced anything related to converting existing framemake document using scripting/program to the format Adobe InDesign?

Thanks

Anil

Report · Apr 01, 2011

There is no method of switching from Frame to ID. Some have suggested saving to rtf and importing that.

Report · Apr 01, 2011

Anil @TCS wrote:
Frame Maker stores the authored document into binary format. My question is any Adobe Scripting/program guide to read the framemaker data and convert in a format which Adobe InDesign can understand.
I read an article that there is a MIF filter tool which provide such functionality. I love coding than using some prebuilt tool.
Is anyone has experienced anything related to converting existing framemake document using scripting/program to the format Adobe InDesign?
Thanks
Anil

Hi, Anil:

If the article you read was in InDesign Magazine, it's probably my review of DTP Tools's MIF Filter plug-in for InDesign.

The FrameMaker Software Development Kit (SDK) is one way to program FrameMaker. Framescript is a third-party tool that runs scripts on FrameMaker. There are some publicly-available Framescripts, and many commercially-available, plus a few folks who custom-develop

Frame's MIF (Maker Interchange Language) is open. Opening an FM file that was saved as MIF perfectly recreates the original; well, not exactly, because it does leave out almost all miscellaneous corruption and garbage, so it's better than the orignal.

FrameMaker 10 introduces scripting with javascript by using ExtendScript. Search Google for terms like "framemaker 10 sdk," "FrameMaker MIF Reference Manual," and "Framescript," without quotes for links to these tools.

In my article I mentioned that there are some FrameMaker constructs that cannot be converted exactly to InDesign, because InDesign doesn't have those features. True sideheads are one example. "Straddle paragraphs" that go across two or more columns are no longer missing in InDesign, where they're called "span paragraphs." If you think you can program true InDesign sideheads, more power to you! The MIF Filter does its best to duplicate the FrameMaker appearance in its InDesign conversions, but the behavior is different; this means that if you edit such "innovative" conversions, they may fall apart.

FrameMaker can export XML and RTF, which InDesign can import, so you may find that these formats are sufficient to migrate your content.

HTH

Regards,

Peter

_______________________

Peter Gold

KnowHow ProServices

Report · Apr 02, 2011

Thanks Peter,

It really helps!

Report · Apr 02, 2011

Anil,

I you love coding the coolest method IMO would be:

Create MIF files from FrameMaker binary documents.
Use Leximation’s MIFML converter to convert the MIF into valid XML
Use XSLT programming to change that XML into ICML (InCopy Markup Language)
Import the resulting InCopy story into an appropriate InDesign template

You would go this way (or any other coded way) only if you have 1000+ pages of content you have to transfer.

- Michael