FrameMaker 2020: can't get rid of welcome screen

[Hobbes0022]

I don't like visual noise, so I want to disable the welcome screen. I found this post which outlines an addition to the maker.ini file to disable the welcome screen.

But it doesn't seem to be working: every time I open FrameMaker, the Welcome Screen is displayed. Even when I double-click a .fm file to open Frame, an extra tab is added for the welcome screen.

Preferences->Global->General contains a setting "show tabbed welcome screen". I've unchecked this, but the next time I start Frame this preference is checked again.

I cannot emphasize this enough: I don't use the welcome screen. I don't want to see the welcome screen.

FM version 16.0.0.754

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Check both maker.ini files to see if the entry is present in both - the User profile one should override the Program Files one if the line is present in both.
But the fact that your preferences aren't being saved indicates that you may have a rights issue to be able to write the changes. Check your access & make sure you have full admin rights. 

[Stefan Gentz · Accepted solution]

Why do you not want to see the welcome screen? It provides a lot of functionality, some of them not being available otherwise (like "Restore Last Session") or showing if a FrameMaker Update is available. 

The "ShowTabbedWelcomeScreen" flag in the maker.ini only controls, if the Welcome Screen also shows up as a file tab if a document is open.

If you want to completely hide the welcome screen, do the following:

1. Close FrameMaker, and then open the maker.ini located in your user profile:
   %appdata%\Adobe\FrameMaker\16\maker.ini
2. Add DontShowWelcomeScreen=On in the [Preferences] section.
3. Save the maker.ini file.
4. Restart FrameMaker.

FrameMaker will not show the Welcome screen now.

Note, that FrameMaker saves all current session settings in the user maker.ini when you close FrameMaker. Therefore, make sure to edit it after you have closed FrameMaker. 

[Hobbes0022]

As I said, I don't like visual noise. The Welcome screen is a pile of disparate items, making it hard to distinguish useful information from clutter. It's full of stuff I don't need. Most of it is just duplication from the menus (where they're out of sight until I decide I need them).

•  Restore last session is in the File menu.
• Recent files are in the File menu.
• I don't need repeats of Open/Connect to repository/connect to url/Create new file either.
• I get update reminders from the Adobe Cloud app, no need to manually check this.
• Product feedback should be in the Help menu.
• Webinars etc. I can find on the Adobe website if I need to. I've been using FrameMaker since 1997, so I don't feel that need very often.

Basically, the Welcome screen feels like a giant billboard ad rather than a useful part of the interface.

I've edited both maker.ini files again, DontShowWelcomeScreen=On is in both files.When I start FM, the welcome screen is not visible, but I still got a welcome screen tab as soon as I opened a file.

In the global maker.ini, there's a ShowTabbedWelcomeScreen preference which was set to On, despite me unchecking this preference in the Preferences dialog.

I set this to Off, and now I can open a file without the welcome screen opening as well.

[Stefan Gentz]

Thanks for your candid feedback.

"In the global maker.ini, there's a ShowTabbedWelcomeScreen preference which was set to On, despite me unchecking this preference in the Preferences dialog."

The maker.ini in the installation folder is the initial configuration and a fallback file in case the user profile gets corrupted. It should never be modified and not even FrameMaker itself makes any changes there. Also, note that any changes made there would be overwritten with an update.

Any user-based configuration changes go into the maker.ini in the user profile. As mentioned in a reply earlier, the user's maker.ini is located here: %appdata%\Adobe\FrameMaker\16\maker.ini

You should only make changes in the maker.ini in this one.

Let me know if you have any more questions regarding this.

[GerhardB.]

ShowTabbedWelcomeScreen=Off in the %appdata%\Adobe\FrameMaker\[FM version]\maker.ini file worked perfect.

We also don't like the tab-based WelcomeScreen, it doesn't contain needful informations during our daily work and just waste needfull space in the tab row, as an info-screen when no tab is open it's o.k..

[Russ Ward]

Hi Stefan, you didn't ask for my opinion, but I wanted to add that I dislike the welcome screen too. It has nothing of value to me and it just takes up a tab space where a document could be. And it always comes back during a session. I appreciate the instructions on how to disable it.

Russ

[Hor Meng15A7]

I have two monitors. The size of the welcome screen is fixed to the main windows. If I move FM to another monitor, the welcome screen is truncated and could not work properly.

[QuintinSeegers]

Our content creators actually like the WelcomeScreen. Granted, in our case, we've modified the welcomescreen.html file to remove all the Adobe 'fluff' and replaced the content with stuff that's relevant/useful for our content creators:

This saves them from having to search for the specific FM template they need to use to create content.

[LinSims]

Oh, now THAT'S clever. I'll have to see if I can figure out how to do this, too, in my copious spare time.

[QuintinSeegers]

I followed one of Matt (Tech Comm Tools)'s great tutorials: https://techcommtools.com/customizing-framemaker-welcome-screen/ and https://techcommtools.com/edit-framemaker-2017-welcome-screen/ . I know a bit of CSS and HTML, so that helped too :-). (And lots of trial and error!)

[4everJang]

With a bit of extra coding (ExtendScript, Javascript and HTML), I created a welcome screen that lists the documents to be edited by the authors. Once a document is marked as done, it will no longer show up. All of the entires are handled by a database somewhere on the intranet. Of course this takes more than just a couple of entries in the maker.ini or a fixed HTML page to replace the existing welcome screen, but it does make the screen into an asset rather than a nuisance.

[lesliec14995818]

I stumbled upon this thread looking for a similar solution, wondering why anyone would want the welcome screen to pop up every single time a new FM file is opened? I could see maybe once when you first open FM but come on, not every time you save a file and then reopen it or want to open another book/document. It works like spam and I can see how people can get irritated by it.

I've not really had a problem with it before until I got the 2020 version and new updates last month and now it pops up like the measles.

To push something on users like a spam nuisance is not very friendly to say the least. And to embed it in the startup program which requires reprogramming is pretty ruthtless as well.

My question is, since I don't have the immediate administrator rights and working from home creates work stoppage and waiting time when going through our IT, is why didn't they make something like disabling the welcome screen a much simpler task that a simple user can switch on or off when required? Is there perhaps a simpler work around?

Thanks, cheers.

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Editing the user version of the maker.ini IS the simpler workaround - that's been standard practise for many versions of FM. For example, I regularly hack it to re-arrange the paste order of text so that plain text (the equivalent of paste-special) is pasted instead of rich text (the default).