RE: The Old Argument: Framemaker vs. MS Word

[Darren Barefoot <dbarefoot -at- mpsbc -dot- com>]

Good morning,

I continue to be frustrated by the presumption that a PDF file is all one
requires to be Web-friendly. Like it or not, Acrobat's PDFs are a stop-gap
solution that will happily go the way of DOS and GOPHER. The only feature
that makes PDFs more Web-enabled than, say, a FrameMaker document is that
the reader software is free. Posting a PDF on the Internet is a bit like
using a View-Master and calling it a film. The Internet, as we know, is not
8.5" x 11".

The reality is, if you want to generate a number of digital output formats
(HTML, HTMLHelp, WinHelp, PDF, etc.), FrameMaker is not a viable
alternative. DB.

-----Original Message-----
From: White, Donald [mailto:Donald -dot- White -at- Nextel -dot- com]
Sent: Thursday, January 20, 2000 1:46 PM
To: TECHWR-L
Cc: 'mking -at- mamsi -dot- com'
Subject: RE: The Old Argument: Framemaker vs. MS Word


I haven't used MS Word 2000 much, and I don't really want to use it. In any
case, the application is not for desktop publishing while Framemaker is
built for that purpose. If you want something from which you can speedily
and accurately translate a file for use over the Web, Framemaker does it
best, too--through Acrobat.

What with all the paragraph formatting and numbering bugs, as well as other
formatting problems with Word, I guess that the only reasons management
would not support Frame is the expense, and because Frame would be used by a
relatively low number of people.

Good luck.

D.H. White
Technical Writer
Nextel Communications
703.433.8460
Donald -dot- White -at- nextel -dot- com