Re: Frame -> Word

[Kathryn Marshall <kmarshall -at- MODACAD -dot- COM>]

Emma,
For what it's worth: I am the only writer at my company and I use
FrameMaker to write the doc. Everyone else uses Word. If I need to write
a memo or something internal, I write it in Word. But the documentation
is always in FrameMaker (online help in RoboHELP). I convert the docs to
PDF for those who want to access them online. It hasn't been a problem
so far. Maybe you can have your cake and eat it too. Good luck!

-Kathy

> ----------
> From:         M. Dannenberg[SMTP:midannen -at- SI -dot- BOSCH -dot- DE]
> Reply To:     midannen -at- si -dot- bosch -dot- de
> Sent:         Tuesday, September 30, 1997 5:27 AM
> To:   TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU
> Subject:      Re: Frame -> Word
>
> Emma Heftman schrieb:
>
> > Dear all
> > My company's decided that all internal documentation should be in
> Word
> > format, despite
> > the fact that most of our manuals were written in FrameMaker. The
> > decision was made because we
> > store our documentation in Lotus Notes and the user's must download
> > FrameReader to read
> > the documentation, whereas with Word they can just click on a
> document
> > and Lotus knows
> > how to open Word.
> > I'm using FrameMaker 5.1 on Unix and Windows '95 platforms.
> > Any-way, I'm the only tech writer here and I've been given the task
> of
> > researching into the
> > issue. So here are my questions:
> > 1. Without getting into a major war, what functionalities is Word
> > lacking?
> > In particular:
> >
>
> Without getting into a major war either (har, har), for me this would
> be
> a pack-my-bags-and-get-the-hell-out-of-there issue. Changing from
> Frame
> to Word is about the most pointy-haired decision you can think of, the
> pain of converting and the loss of functionality and reliability will
> outweigh any possible (or imagined) gains.
>
> If it's really just a matter of making the docs available for viewing,
> you might suggest converting to PDF. The Acrobat viewer is a very nice
> unproblematic piece of software and it's even free. It should be
> posible
> to set up Notes to open it automatically on encountering a PDF file.
> Coming to think of it, this might also be possible with FrameReader.
>
> In a very large organisation it may appear to make sense to convert
> documents to Word rather than installing a viewer on 10000 PCs. On the
> other hand, I'd much rather personally install Acrobat viewer on 10000
> machines than convert a large set of docs to Word.
>
>
> Mike
>
> --
> Mike Dannenberg
> ETAS GmbH & Co.KG
> midannen -at- si -dot- bosch -dot- de
>
> ~~
>  TECHWR-L (Technical Communication) List Information: To send a
> message
> to 2500+ readers, e-mail to TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU -dot-  Send
> commands
>    to LISTSERV -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU (e.g. HELP or SIGNOFF TECHWR-L).
>   Search the archives at http://www.documentation.com/  or search and
> browse the archives at
> http://listserv.okstate.edu/archives/techwr-l.html
>  Send list questions or problems to the listowner at
>

 TECHWR-L (Technical Communication) List Information: To send a message
to 2500+ readers, e-mail to TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU -dot-  Send commands
   to LISTSERV -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU (e.g. HELP or SIGNOFF TECHWR-L).
  Search the archives at http://www.documentation.com/  or search and
browse the archives at http://listserv.okstate.edu/archives/techwr-l.html