PDF generation from FrameMaker v8

[L0NN1E]

The "Save to PDF" feature (in FrameMaker v8) decided to stop working for me.  I used to use it regularly, and it used to work just fine.  I haven't been able to figure out why it is no longer working.

When I select it, I am shown the "PDF Setup for Selected Files" dialog, as usual, and I press [Set] as usual.  The status bar displays "Opening Chapter1.fm", etc., for each chapter, but then it just quietly stops.  When the target PDF file pre-existed, the target PDF was deleted, but no new PDF file appears in its place.  It does produce a Book.log file which has the following contents:

%%[ ProductName: Distiller ]%%
%%[ Error: syntaxerror; OffendingCommand: %%[ Flushing: rest of job (to end-of-file) will be ignored ]%%
%%[ Warning: PostScript error. No PDF file produced. ] %%

I had the installer attempt to repair the installation, and when that didn't work, I uninstalled, re-downloaded, and re-installed Adobe FrameMaker v8.  I also had the installer repair "Adobe PDF Creation Add-on".   None of this had any impact -- the symptom remains the same.

I also tried "Print Book..." with "Print to file: Book.ps" and "Generate Acrobat Data [PDF]" set, and Printer: Adobe PDF.  This produced a Book.ps file, but no PDF file, nor did the PDF printer ask for a file name.  I don't normally generate the PDF in this fashion, so I'm not as comfortable with this method, but as a diagnostic, the fact that it also didn't generate the PDF seems to be a clue.  I assume Distiller is malfunctioning?

Can anyone give me some clues as to where I should look next?  Can I do anything that would provide further diagnostic clues?  Is there any paper that describes the architecture of Distiller / PDF-creator, which I might refer to for tracking down what configuration is messed up?

Thanks,

Lonnie

[Art_Campbell1]

When you activated the Print To File checkbox on the Adobe Print dialog box, you disabled the automatic conversion of the file to a PDF.

Check Generate Acrobat Data, then UNcheck Print to File and try it again.

Art

[L0NN1E]

Thank you Art for the quick reply.

I unchecked "Print to File" in the Print Book dialog, but it didn't solve the problem.

With "Print to file" unchecked, "Generate Acrobat Data" checked, and Printer set to Adobe PDF, the "Print Book..." option proceeded in a similar fashion as before, with the status bar displaying "Opening Chapter 1.fm", etc. for each chapter, and then terminating.  However, at this point another dialog is now on the screen that has a title bar "Creating Adobe PDF".  This dialog has a progress bar which is hung at about 10%.  It is totally hung.  There are no other dialogs anywhere on the screen.

After unchecking "Print to file" in the "Print Book.." dialog, I also retried "Save as PDF" again.  The checkbox option didn't seem to have any effect on this.

Any more ideas?

Thanks,

Lonnie

[Art_Campbell1]

And -- it's almost impossible to trouble shoot without you providing full system info:

OS / RAM / FM version (the p number you see when you run Help > About) / Acrobat or Distiller version / whether the Acrobat printer is set as the system default... and anything else that you think may be relevent.

[L0NN1E]

My system info:

About box reads: FrameMaker 8.0p266

My "Add or Remove Programs" dailog shows: p266, p273, p276 and p277 as being installed.  But since I re-installed framemaker, perhaps those are no longer active.   I scanned release notes for those patches and didn't see anything that looked related to this.

Operating System: Windows XP x64

RAM:  8GB

Processor: Intel Core 2 Quad Q9300 @2.5GHz

System default printer: Adobe PDF

----

I just tried printing from another application (not framemaker) to the Adobe PDF printer.  The filename dialog appeared, but after pressing OK, the "Creating Adobe PDF" dialog hung at 10% again, as it did with "Print Book...".   Makes me think it may have something to do with that "Adobe PDF" printer.  Shouldn't the re-install of FMv8 have re-installed that printer driver?  Is there a way to reinstall it?

Thanks,

Lonnie

[Bob_Niland]

But since I re-installed framemaker, perhaps those are no longer active.

If you didn't explicitly re-install the patches (all of them, in order), then you need to do so.

It's clear that FM isn't seeing p273-p277.

Whether or not you need to uninstall the patches via Windows before re-installing is not known to me. You might have trouble re-installing if Mr.Bill thinks they're already there.

[Art_Campbell1]

In addition to having to re-install the FM patches....

Because you're on XP, you MUST install the MicroSoft PostScript Hotfix. It's likely that the combination of installing the HotFix and putting the patches in place will fix your problem (crossing fingers). http://support.microsoft.com/kb/952909

But these two tasks are the baseline that you need to haul yourself up to before you can really do any more trouble-shooting.

Art

[L0NN1E]

I re-installed the FM v8 patches, so that now I'm at FM 8.0p277.   Problem still persists, no change to symptoms.

The hotfix link was an excellent suggestion.  It definitely looked like it might be relevant.  Unfortunately, the hotfix page does not provide a download for XP x64.  I contemplated trying the Server 2003 x64 version, but after reading the warnings that came with it, I chicked out on trying that.  I put in a request to Microsoft for the XP x64 hotfix, which I have not received, but as I studied the hotfix a bit more, it looked less and less likely that this would be the problem, and even that I should probably not install it.  The hotfix itself replaces atmfd.dll with a new one labeled as version 5.1.2.277.   So I checked the version of my atmdf.dll, and I'm at 5.2.2.232.  The hotfix itself was put out in 2008.  I suspect I'm way past it in my Windows updates, and seems like it would be a bad idea to revert back to an earlier version.

The other thing that deserves mention is the fact that Save to PDF was working for me for the past 3 years, so my system has probably had whatever hotfix it needs.  I willingly concede that there are several holes in this, but it is still fairly compelling.

I clearly have something wrong with the "Adobe PDF Converter" printer driver.  So I think it is a logical course of action to focus on it.  For example, when I pull up any application (e.g., Notepad), and then Print... to the "Adobe PDF" printer, the "Creating Adobe PDF" progress dialog hangs indefinitely, usually with about 10% of the progress bar elapsed.  It seems like a simpler piece to focus on for now -- solve that, and I'll bet the Framemaker problem gets fixed.

I don't know how one re-installs the "Adobe PDF Converter" printer driver.  I'm pretty sure it got there when I installed FrameMaker v8.  My "C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe" directory has these subdirectories:

Acrobat 8.0

Adobe Help Viewer

Flash Player

FrameMaker8

Reader 10.0

Reader 8.0

There is a subdirectory C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Acrobat 8.0\Acrobat\Xtras\AdobePDF\AMD64

which I think contains be the "Adobe PDF" printer driver files.  The three DLLs in that directory all have valid digital signatures.  I assume that if one of them became corrupted for some reason, the digital signature would be invalidated.

Are there any theories for what the "Adobe PDF Converter" might be hanging on?  Anything relevant I can check or test via DevStudio (which I have)?

Continued thanks for all your efforts,

Lonnie

[AxialInfo]

Do you have a standalone Adobe Acrobat Pro version on your system, or are you using the PDF printer that can be installed when you install FrameMaker?

[L0NN1E]

Only the one that installed with FrameMaker v8.

I have not installed Acrobat  ( except for Reader, of course )

[Art_Campbell1]

I don't think there is more than one version of the HotFix (I believe most, if not all, XP PS drivers were 32-bit), and because it is a HotFix, it is not included in the normal stream of Windows updates. So unless you installed it, you don't have it, and there isn't a 64-bit version.

After installing it, from http://support.microsoft.com/?id=952909 , you can always uninstall it.

But it's the most likely problem -- the XP PostScript handling was flawed for years and this is the fix.

Cheers,

Art

[Mike Wickham]

>

Acrobat 8.0

Adobe Help Viewer

Flash Player

FrameMaker8

Reader 10.0

Reader 8.0

>

I see a major problem right there. You have two many versions of Acrobat

& Reader installed. Adobe warns against installing more than one version

TOTAL of Acrobat, Reader, or the PDF Creation Add-on that comes with

FrameMaker (and may be the "Adobe PDF Converter" that you mentioned).

The different versions can cause massive conflicts with each other.

You should uninstall all versions of Acrobat and Reader and the PDF

Creation Add-on in reverse order that you installed them. REBOOT, then

install ONLY one version of Acrobat OR one version of Reader OR one

version of the PDF Creation Add-on. (I assume that you will want to

install Acrobat to get the most features.)

[Dov Isaacs]

Important Note!

Virtually NO Adobe product does or ever did either officially or unofficially support the 64-bit version of Windows XP!! This is especially true for Acrobat due to the various linkages between the AdobePDF PostScript driver instance and the Distiller which very operating system version dependent (where version includes 32-bit versus 64-bit).

(Windows XP 64-bit was effectively more of an experiment on the part of Microsoft than a viable product with very spotty driver and system software support from most device and application software vendors. Windows Vista 64-bit and Windows 7 64-bit software and drivers do not necessarily work with Windows XP 64-bit as the specifications for same are different than for WIndows XP 64-bit.)

The first official Windows 64-bit support for Adobe products was for Windows Vista 64-bit.

We most strongly recommend that you upgrade your operating system to Windows 7 64-bit and the latest version of Acrobat if you truly want/need compatible Windows 64-bit support for Adobe products.

          - Dov

[L0NN1E]

The disclaimer about not supporting XP x64 is a bit overboard.  I've been using FrameMaker v8 for the past 3 years without any problem until now.  In fact, FrameMaker continues to work fine - its just the Save to PDF and PDF Printer driver has stopped working.  I suspect something somewhere has gotten corrupted.

Anyway, I went ahead and installed the hotfix.  The XP 32-bit one didn't install (reports a Setup error, "updatebr.inf is invalid").  The Server 2003 x64 one installed happily, and so far nothing horrible has happened.  But the symptoms of my problem haven't changed -- the problem persists.

Lonnie

[Dov Isaacs]

If you have it working, mazel tov! I am truly glad you have what you believe you need working.

However, the fact is that many users have had problems with this, Adobe has never supported it, and in the interest of full disclosure, it is appropriate that users be warned against using a non-supported configuration.

          - Dov

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

The Save As PDF method was reported as being flakey in earlier versions. Try printing to the Adobe PDF virtual printer instance (it should be set as your default printer in FM - use the fab & free SetPrint plug-in to have this set automagically for you); select the Generate Acrobat Data flag & make sure that "Print to File: " isn't selected. What happens then?

[AxialInfo]

The wonderful freebie SetPrint that Jeff mentioned above is here:

Sundorne Communications - FrameMaker

[L0NN1E]

Success -- Problem Solved!

First, let me thank everyone who took the time to respond to my question and contribute ideas.  The rapidness of feedback was very impressive and very helpful.

I find it important to summarize the final conclusions in a thread like this for the sake of people later who are searching for similar problems.  So allow me to do so here.

I ultimately solved the problem my uninstalling EVERYTHING from Adobe (except for Flash Player), so that the Program Files (x86)\Adobe directory was empty except for Flash Player, and then running the FrameMaker v8 installer.

I am pretty certain that the original source of the problem was a hard disk error (I did find a hard disk error logged in the Windows event log) -- presumably the error caused a key file to corrupt.  The problem, of course, was figuring out how to get things to reinstall to refresh the damaged file.

My primary gotcha was the fact that the "Adobe PDF Creation Add-On" installer's Repair functionality does not actually repair the installation.  You have to entirely uninstall it, entirely uninstall Framemaker, then run the Framemaker installer.  My mistake was that I entirely uninstalled Framemaker, then re-installed it before I had uninstalled the PDF Creation Add-On.  If you don't uninstall the add-on, the Framemaker installer doesn't re-install it or repair it.  After that, I tried to fix the add-on by using its repair functionality.  Since I didn't have, and couldn't find, a separate "Adobe PDF Creation Add-On" installer, I didn't know what to do to uninstall and re-install it.  So I tried to rely on the Repair functionality.   It is rather confusing because both FrameMaker and the Adobe PDF Creation Add-On appear in the Add or Remove Programs folder, and each is uninstalled independently, but apparently the only way to install the latter is to run the installer for the former.

It was necessary to re-install Reader again, in order to have the ability to view the PDF after it was created.  I conclude that uninstalling it was ultimately unnecessary.

Once again, thank you everyone.  Looks like I'm back in business.

Lonnie