comparing FrameMaker documents

Subject: comparing FrameMaker documents
From: "Rédactrice Technique" <redaqtechnique -at- gmail -dot- com>
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Date: Wed, 8 Aug 2007 17:58:30 +0200

Hi List,

I've just taken a tech writing role where I'm the only writer in a team of
engineers. The previous writer has moved on and I've inherited his old
documents.

One of the first things I did was to convert the existing manuals from one
(long!) document to book format, although I'm now not sure this was the my
most brilliant idea, mainly for the following reason:

One of the project managers here has asked me to come up with a way of
comparing document versions, so that customers can see exactly what has
changed between one version and another, like with the Word Track Changes
feature (a change history table already exists, but he wants more detail).

I've just finished updating a book, so I tried the FM Compare Books feature.
First problem, the composite docs are strewn all over the shop, and I had to
re-assemble them into book format.

But, secondly and most importantly, it hasn't worked! Frame has marked some
text and tables as changed (inserted) when they haven't been touched, and
hasn't marked some things that HAVE been changed.

There is no way I can deliver the document in its current state to the PM,
never mind a customer.

Any ideas of how to improve this 'feature' or of other methods I could try?

I've already tried comparing the two pdfs, but frankly, the result of that
was even worse than Frame's efforts.

I'm all out of ideas, so any help will be much appreciated.

Thanks a lot,

RT.
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