RE: Word up

[Paul Hanson <PHanson -at- Quintrex -dot- com>]

Is anyone using Frame to create .hlp files because the last time I
heard, people were saying Word was better to use. <see quote below>
<begin quote>
			From the RH list: "FrameMaker is _much_ better
than Word at managing long and/or multichapter books. If you have need
to produce such books -- in print, HTML, or PDF - and if you can only
choose one or the other tool, Frame would be the way to go. It is really
a BAD idea to use Word as a production tool for professional, book-
length publications; Word is just not robust enough in the areas of
indexing, cross-referencing, TOC and list generation, conditional text,
version control, formatting, graphics handling, print quality, and
multi-part book management (to name a few necessities)." 
			Having said that, Word is the better choice if
all you do is write WinHelp, if for no other reason than most of the
help authoring tools out there are built around Word. You can write
WinHelp in Frame, and do a decent job of it, but your choices of tools
are more limited. Word also really shines when it comes to writing
macros; WordBasic and VBA are admirably robust languages that let you
customize your environment in many, many ways; indeed, most of the help
authoring tools out there draw heavily on WordBasic or VBA.What do I
use? <snip>I use Frame for writing books, and Word for writing WinHelp.
You can export Frame 5 source as RTF, which lets you reuse your content
to a large extent." 
<end quote>

All of Tim's points are true as far as Word's deficiencies. I like going
out to http://www.microsith.com every once in a while. 

I object to a blanket statement such as "Word is inefficient to use"
when all I'm doing is creating WinHelp.

Paul

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Tim Altom [SMTP:taltom -at- simplywritten -dot- com]
	<snip>
> In short, Word is inefficient to use. 
	<snip>

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