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FrameMaker can be o.k. for round-trip XML, IF you first gather your requirements for now and the foreseeable future and decide that the limitations that come with a FM-based solution are acceptable. I would agree to your impression that it is not trivial (i.e. expensive) to build a good solution in FrameMaker.
The major drawback of round-tripping XML in FrameMaker is still its lack of Unicode capabilities. This means that you have to build special mappings that handle special characters outside the standard 8-bit ASCII range. All limitations known from earlier FrameMaker versions concerning character handling still apply, albeit the Adobe marketing department does an excellent job in making people believe otherwise. Since you are based in France, you will probably have to consider this topic. Even more so if multilangual publications are an issue.
I would suggest that you
- gather all requirements the solution has to fulfil. Do consider things that are not on your agenda right now that might become important later such as client/server capabilities, versioning, multi-channel output, and so on.
- calculate what it takes to build a solution in FrameMaker (BUT: Take into account the time you or others at your company would have to be involved in building the solution!)
- make a short evaluation of XML-based information management solutions on the market and compare their price with the FM-based solution.
If the FM-based solution can fulfil your requirements at an acceptable price, go for it. If not, take a closer look at the other options.
-----Original message-----
From: Jennifer Mueller [mailto:jenmueller_1 -at- yahoo -dot- com]
Sent: Friday, 15. November 2002 10:21
To: TECHWR-L
Re: FrameMaker 7.0 and XML/structured docs
Is anyone out there using FrameMaker 7.0 to write round-trip XML
documentation? Would you be willing to share your experiences and/or
opinions about this?
[...]
Jennifer Mueller
Paris, France
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