Version incompatibility in FrameMaker

[Yogesh5C2D]

Hello,

I am using Adobe FrameMaker 2020 while my other team members are still on the 2019 version. We need to work in a collaborative environment where we all need to update the FrameMaker Source topic files. I can open the 2019 FM files on my latest version (2020). However, if I make any edits to those files, my team, who is on the earlier version, cannot open the files. I did refer to some of the older posts where we've discussed this issue and tried the following:

• I saved all the files in my source book in the 2019 .fm format, saved the entire book as 2019 .book.
• I saved all my files in .mif format and shared with the team assuming they could open it.

But no luck. FM acts in an inconsitent manner. We see the messages similar to the following:

• The file '<filename>.fm' is not a FrameMaker file. FrameMaker can try to open the file either in FrameMaker or in the file's native application. Open '<filename>.fm' using...
• Although <file path>\<Book name>.book appears to be a FrameMaker document, it can't be opened with this release of the product.

Am I missing something? How to deal with this version incompatibility? Please guide.

Regards,

Yogesh

[Winfried Reng]

Hi Yogesh,

When you save your FM 2020 files as FM 2019, then users with FM 2019 will be able to open them.

When you open the FM file with a text editor, you see in the beginning of the very first line:

<MakerFile 16.0> for FM 2020

<MakerFile 15.0> for FM 2019

If you find 15, then you did not save correctly. How did you do this? Savest is:

Copy all files into a new folder, e.g. fm2019. Use your file manager and not FrameMaker.

Then open all files with FM 2020 and save each as FM 2019 and overwrite the existing file in this folder.

When you change file names, the book will try to open the original file.

When you save as MIF 2020, those files can be opened with FM 2019. FrameMaker 2019 ignores the features which it cannot process. Do not save as MIF 7.0!

Best regards

Winfried

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Check the header of the FM2019 file as Winfried suggests. There may be an issue with the patch version of FM2019 that the 2020 Save As is doing. Are all the copies of FM2019 on the same patch version? Is your FM2020 copy running the latest version too?

[LinSims]

If you're having to do this with large numbers of files, you might want to check into Rick Quatro's ConvertDocs script, which batch converts files and books to earlier versions of Frame and MIF. It will convert your docs from FM 16 (2020) to FM 15 (2019) and will also convert the FM 15 files back up to FM 16. 

Or you could use the Book Utilities, which performs a MIF wash on your entire book, to batch convert your FM files to MIF.