Trouble creating-and-including AND excluding entries in TOC

Report · Jul 06, 2023

I am updating an existing document that was created long ago by someone who is longer with our company. The previous author/editor knew even less about FrameMaker than I do.

The single document is not part of a .book file and it contains what appears to be a generated TOC on its own (again, self-contained) pages 2 and 3.

I HAVE found Insert > Table of Contents > Create Standalone TOC, but can't find a way to effectively edit or revise the setup of the already-existing, self-contained table of contents.

While experimenting with Markers and Paragraph Formats, I accidentally made one important TOC entry disappear, which makes me think this TOC that I'm trying to repair/update IS dynamic/updatable, and not just dead text that someone typed manually.
I have also tried to delete a TOC entry that displays only a page number but no other text (included image). I have searched its page in the body of the document and accomplished nothing by looking for every possible Marker or wrongly-Paragraph-Formatted line on that page.

As with my previous cry for help, I can't really include detailed examples of our "proprietary content".

Any help would be very, very, VERY much appreciated.

Thanks,

Lew Yedwab

Report · Jul 06, 2023

PS: My mistake: The included image's title refers to a bogus TOC entry on page 52. As you can see, the mystery entry occurs on page 53.

Report · Jul 06, 2023

So it's just a single .fm document? So that can't be a generated TOC because that requires a book and you'd have a filenameTOC.fm in the .book file. Maybe it's a mini-TOC added to a page within the doc?

Report · Jul 06, 2023

Whoa! Good lead! I've certainly SEEN the Mini-TOC option but have studiously avoided fooling around with it.

(Also, I forgot to mention that I have created Standalone TOCs, so I know what you're talking about with regard to those being separate files that need to be part of a FrameMaker Book.)

I've got so many safety copies of the document that I'm going to try deleting the existing TOC and creating a Mini-TOC. I would ask if THOSE are dynamic, but I guess I'll find out.

Report · Jul 06, 2023

Yes, a mini-TOC is dynamic. You can learn about the three kinds of TOCs that FrameMaker can create for you in this webinar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCgKwBGGXLw. They are covered in the first section.

~Barb

Report · Jul 07, 2023

Thank you, Barbara! Watching the video all the way through, and I haven't fixed the problem yet, but I'm closer than I was.