FrameMaker Developer Kit vs Cloud solution

[henry6782]

Hi all,

This is my understanding about FDK:

(1) The Adobe FrameMaker Developer Kit (FDK) is a set of C libraries and header files that allow you to write Application Programmer Interface (API) clients or plug-ins using the C or C++ programming language.

 (2) Using the FDK, an API client can perform interactive user tasks and more. It gives programmers direct access to all the objects in a FrameMaker session or document. This includes graphics, text, markers, paragraphs, formats, and more.

(3) Only be invoked through FrameMaker application and the FrameMaker must be run parallel with the integration application

That means we cannot create a services on cloud to transfrom a Framemaker file to XML by suing FDK?

Do you have any ideas for a cloud services to transform a Framemaker file to XML?

[frameexpert]

There is a FrameMaker Server product, but I am not sure if it has the functionality that you want.

[henry6782]

Hi,

I did some research on  FrameMaker Server product and it may work for me, but there are something need to understand:

1.  FrameMaker Server product included FM Windows desktop application and Web Server. That mean the Web server cannot executre the tasks without FM Windows desktop application. Is it correct?

2. The tasks only can run sequencely and cannot run multiple tasks at the same time, right?

Thanks.

[frameexpert]

1 is true, but I am not sure about 2.

[henry6782]

Thanks. I already installed FrameMaker Server product  but  "Add New Task" button disappeared. Let me try to find the way to config the server work and see how tasks will be execute.

 My services requires to provide API to transform FM file to XML and it must execute multiple transform execute at the same time on 1 instance of FrameMaker Server Web and FrameMaker Client. 

[frameexpert]

Please let me know if you need any scripting help within FrameMaker. I have done some ExtendScript integration with FrameMaker Publishing Server in the past. This is useful if you need to modify a FrameMaker document before export or after import from XML. I can also help you with XSLT; XSLT transforms can automatically be applied on import/export. Thanks. -Rick

[frameexpert · Accepted solution]

But as far as your questions, 1 and 2 are true. There is a way to invoke and FDK client on FrameMaker startup so, while 3 is true, you may be able to start FrameMaker with some other process in order to kick off the FDK client.

[henry6782]

Thank you so much. Let me do study on FrameMaker Publishing Server to make sure they will support the features