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Subject:Indexing with BookMaster From:"Larry Kunz ((919) 254-6395)" <ldkunz -at- VNET -dot- IBM -dot- COM> Date:Thu, 2 Dec 1993 11:35:05 EST
Joan Stout writes:
> Do any of you prepare indexes with BookMaster? If so,
> I'd like to hear about your experiences. I am especially
> interested in the tags that you insert into files. Are the
> tags easy to use? Is the syntax difficult? Is it difficult
> to come up with a unique ID for each heading, or is this
> even necessary?
Here at IBM, everyone I know uses "central file indexing." All the
index entries (:i1, :i2, :i3, :ih1, and :ih2 tags) are stored in one
file, which is imbedded in the master file. Every entry has an ID.
We use :iref tags in the body of the document to call out the various
index entries as needed.
Since every :iref refers to the central index file, it's easy to keep
track of "see" and "see also" entries. And we avoid the pitfall of,
say, inserting an :i1 into the middle of an index structure in the
body of the book. The IDs on the entries can be as simple as 'a2'
(second entry in the A's) or 'a21' (first sub-entry under second entry
in the A's). Use whatever naming convention works for you.
