A list of all webinars and descriptions are available here (click to access):

• On the Adobe website
• On our Facebook Events page

Here’s the list. Click to read the descriptions and register:

• Enhanced XML Editing and CMS Integration Capabilities in Adobe FrameMaker 10
• Multi-screen Publishing and Next-Generation Collaboration Workflows in Adobe RoboHelp 9
• Strategies for Building and Managing Large Online Libraries
• Localization Efficiencies Series #1: Best Practices in Structured & Unstructured Authoring
• Localization Efficiencies Series #2: Best Practices in Help & Policy Authoring and Publishing
• Integrating the CRX Lite (Day Software) CMS with FrameMaker 10
• Mobile and Social – The Future of Technical Communication
• Confessions of an ‘Enlightened’ Mind – Top 10 Mistakes to Avoid when Starting a Help Project!

USEFUL ACTIVITIES

• Have a Sales Query? Want a Call Back?

• Try Technical Communication Suite 3.5 for FREE

• Try FrameMaker 10 for FREE

• Try RoboHelp 9 for FREE

• Calculate how FrameMaker is the Highest ROI, Lowest TCO XML Editing & Publishing Solution

LEARNING RESOURCES

• Upcoming LIVE eSeminars

• On-Demand eSeminars

• Technical Communication CHANNEL on Adobe T

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP WHITEPAPERS

• Technical Communication Suite Whitepapers

• FrameMaker Whitepapers

• RoboHelp Whitepapers

GETTING STARTED TOOLKIT

• Technical Communication Suite 3.5 Guide

• FrameMaker 10 Guide

• RoboHelp 9 Guide

GET SOCIAL MEDIA UPDATES

• Join the Largest Technical Communication Facebook Community

• Join the Largest LinkedIn Network for Technical Communication Professionals

• Get Adobe Technical Communication Updates on Twitter

• Adobe Technical Communication Blog

WHY UPGRADE TO THE LATEST VERSION

• Technical Communication Suite Upgrade Guide

• FrameMaker Upgrade Guide

• RoboHelp Upgrade Guide

FREE GOLD SUPPORT, COST SAVINGS

• Technical Communication Suite – Want to get FREE GOLD SUPPORT and SAVE LICENSING COSTS?

• FrameMaker – Want to get FREE GOLD SUPPORT and SAVE LICENSING COSTS?

• RoboHelp – Want to get FREE GOLD SUPPORT and SAVE LICENSING COSTS?

Exam Registration:

Follow this link to register for the exam and take your first step to become an ACE in Adobe RoboHelp 9!

Exam Preparation:

The following are typical tasks that you should already be able to perform:

• Author content targeted toward end users including manuals, online tutorials, and knowledgebase articles
• Manage content workflows that incorporate collaboration with other authors and subject matter experts
• Create help content that provides access to external Web content
• Create context-sensitive help
• Create content that can be distributed/published via multichannels and multidevices including CHM/HTML, Adobe AIR, PDF, and EPUB
• Use supplied scripts
• Use existing skins and edit skins (WebHelp and AIR Help)
• Imports external content (for example, Microsoft Word, Adobe FrameMaker, XML, and HTML files)
• Create content such that it can be easily reused

Exam Topics include:

• Customizing the environment (workspace) and application
  • Given a scenario, create an environment
  • Given a scenario, configure application- and project-level settings (General, Recent Projects, and File Association tabs)
• Creating and managing projects
  • Create a project by selecting the appropriate settings in the New Project Wizard dialog box
  • Create and import topics into a project
  • Given a scenario, create a merged project
  • Given a scenario, generate reports and identify solutions for reported problems
• Editing topics
  • Given a property of a topic, explain the purpose of that property. (Properties include: title, master page, status, indexing, search keyword, exclude from search)
  • Change the appearance of a topic by using style sheets and master pages
• Importing content
  • Evaluate and modify a Microsoft Word document to ensure it can be efficiently imported into RoboHelp
  • Evaluate and modify a FrameMaker doc to ensure it can be efficiently imported into RoboHelp
  • Import XML files
• Working with styles and master pages
  • Create style sheets
  • Create master pages
  • Create and use styles
• Creating and managing lists and tables
  • Create and manage lists
  • Create and manage tables
• Creating links and user navigation
  • Create and edit links
  • Create and manage bookmarks
  • Create and manage TOCs
  • Create and manage indexes
  • Create and manage See Also and Related Topics buttons
  • Create an image map link
  • Create and manage breadcrumb navigation
  • Create and manage glossaries
• Inserting graphics and multimedia
  • Insert and manage graphics
  • Given a multimedia type, insert and manage that multimedia type. (Multimedia types include: Captivate, MP3, SWF, AVI, FLV)
• Creating and editing reusable content
  • Create and manage User Defined Variables
  • Create and manage snippets
  • Use Resource Manager to create, manage, and share resources
• Inserting DHTML
  • Create and manage User Defined Variables
  • Create and manage drop-down menus
  • Create and manage expanding hotspots
  • Create and manage text-only popups
• Creating conditional build tags
  • Create and manage conditional build tags
  • Attach conditional build tags to project assets
  • Create conditional output
• Implementing context-sensitive Help
  • Given a scenario, identify the tasks a content author performs to implement context-sensitive Help
  • Implement automatic CSH mapping
  • Given a scenario, identify the steps to test context-sensitive Help
• Managing the spell checker and search
  • Manage language settings and dictionaries
  • Create and manage keywords and synonyms
  • Given a set of user requirements, set up search
  • Implement external content search
• Generating and distributing output
  • Given a Single Source Layout, select the appropriate properties for that Single Source Layout. (Single Source Layouts include: FlashHelp, HTML Help, WebHelp, Adobe AIR, Printed Documentation, XML Layout ePub Format).
  • Given a set of user requirements, generate a Single Source Layout
  • Given a Single Source Layout, create a checklist for distributing the output
• Implementing review and collaboration
  • Implement different types of review and collaboration
  • Import and manage comments and tracked changes
• Working with skins
  • Create and manage skins
  • List and describe the functionality of the WebHelp Skin Editor
  • Given a scenario, determine which type of skin should be used. (Skin types include: AIR Help, FlashHelp, and WebHelp)
• Automating tasks
  • Given a scenario, configure a script
  • Create, manage, and run scripts
• Working with other applications
  • Manage linked FrameMaker and Word documents
  • Given a scenario, identify the benefits of hosting the output on a RoboHelp server
  • Given a scenario, identify the benefits of using RoboSource Control
  • Create, edit, and manage screen captures by using RoboScreenCapture

Need more information? Leave a comment here and we’ll get back to you…

Good luck!

Ankur Jain
Product Manager – Technical Communication Suite | RoboHelp | RoboHelp Server
Follow me on Twitter: @ankurjain8

Adobe is happy to return as the exclusive primary sponsor of the Conference for Software User Assistance 2012. We hope you make the most of all we have in store.

1. Sign-Up for the Adobe Thought Leadership Event on Help and Policy Authoring & Publishing: March 11, 2012, 8:00am-1:00pm CST, The Peabody Memphis. Join Alan Houser, Bernard Aschwanden, Beth Gerber, Joe Welinske, John Daigle, Matt Sullivan, Max Hoffmann, Pam Harrison, Peter Grainge and, Rick Stone as they discuss industry trends and share experiences. Event Agenda.
2. Register for the WritersUA 2012 Conference with an Adobe $200 discount: Get a US$200 discount on the conference registration fee for WritersUA 2012 Conference. This offer is available only if you register before 11.59 PM PST on 24th Feb 2012 via this Adobe promotional program.

Even if you are not attending the event, you still stand a chance to win a full version of Adobe Technical Communication Suite 3.5 software. Click here.

See you there!

TechComm @ Adobe

But there are always those few keyboard shortcuts that elude you just when you need them the most–when you are holding down the Alt key and wondering what to press next!

But not any more! Here’s a ready reckoner of some commonly used FrameMaker keyboard shortcuts.

FrameMaker keyboard shortcut reference

Here’s a PDF for on-screen viewing, and here’s a PDF for printing. Latter is an A3-sized poster that you can print on an A4-sized paper.

Access all of the shortcuts here in the documentation.

Do share your commonly used FM shortcuts in the comments.

So, I am back after the break! Now, with all the recent events and all the talk about SOPA and PIPA, I thought  I will start with this thought. Although I am all in favor of free information and Internet that is not regulated, but “Adobe tech comm blogs” is not going to go dark as we have an important mission to serve the FrameMaker community and so, here is the next post in the series of blog posts we are doing on FrameMaker to provide accurate and relevant information to our users.

Today, we are in for a special treat as we have a guest blogger in Scott Prentice. Scott doesn’t need any introduction, but here is a short bio. Scott is the founder of Leximation and creator of the popular DITA-FMx plug-in that runs on FrameMaker. Scott has years and years of experience in the technical communication space, and he has been a FrameMaker user since 1991 and a FrameMaker developer since 1997. You can read more about him and his company on the Leximation website.

Enjoy the blog post from Scott below…

Regards,

Kapil Verma – Sr. Product Manager, FrameMaker and FrameMaker Server

****************************** START OF BLOG POST FROM SCOTT **********************************************

People often complain that it’s too hard to edit XML files in FrameMaker. Before you can effectively edit files you need to set up a structure application for that XML model. A structure application is a set of special files and instructions that tell FrameMaker how to apply formatting to the XML tags and content in an XML file. This information is stored in a file called the structure application definition file, which contains all of the “definitions” for each structure application available to FrameMaker.

If you’re given an XML file to edit, and are provided with the structure application for that XML model, it’s easy to install the structure application files and start editing. However, if you don’t have a structure application, creating one can require a bit of effort when all you want to do is make some edits. If it’s not important to work in a WYSIWYG mode, you can edit your XML file without setting up a structure application as long as the file includes a valid reference to a DTD. You can toggle the tags on or off and make edits to the content as needed. But if you’ll be doing any significant editing, it’s likely that you’ll want some amount of formatting (even if it’s just to distinguish between block and inline elements and make headings bold). This really isn’t all that different from other XML editors that provide a WYSIWYG or “Author” editing mode. They all require some type of configuration or setup to associate elements and contexts with a particular formatted representation of those elements.

Keep in mind that although FrameMaker is often associated with book production and page layout (which it excels in), the formatting applied by your structure application does not need to use or imply page-oriented formatting. In fact, you can make the formatting look very basic, like a simple web page. Personally, I like to encourage this approach when authoring XML documents. If you’re authoring XML, you are probably producing deliverables for many different output formats, and it’s best if the author is not writing with any of those output formats in mind. When working in this way, you’ll have two structure applications, one for authoring which uses a very simple layout, and one for publishing which applies the page-based formatting that you want in a printed book.

While FrameMaker is actually very similar to other XML editors in features and functionality, it’s important to keep in mind that FrameMaker is not just another XML editor. In addition to being an editor (for both unstructured and structured documents), it is also a state of the art print publishing engine. Most (all?) other XML editors require a completely different tool in order to render the XML tags and content into a format that is acceptable for a printed page or book. With FrameMaker you get both tools in one, and with that added power comes a bit more effort up front. This is a significant advantage, and in the long run, well worth the extra effort.

I like to think of the FrameMaker XML authoring process as “front-loading” the publishing effort. Once you can edit an XML file in FrameMaker, you can also get a beautiful PDF file ready for printing or online delivery. Other XML editors may allow you to edit the XML file quickly, but in order to generate a PDF, you’ll need to learn XSL-FO (or hire someone who knows it), then buy an FO rendering engine to create the PDF. (XSL-FO is an open source language for transforming XML into PDF.) Yes, there are other options for creating a PDF from XML other than XSL-FO, but they all require considerable amount of knowledge and coding and/or a considerable amount of money.

The icing on the cake is that a PDF generated from FrameMaker is likely to look much nicer than one generated from an FO-based process. XSL-FO just does not support the same level of formatting and layout as that available within FrameMaker, no matter how much time you spend on crafting the FO stylesheets.

Granted, there can be a fair amount of effort required to create a structure application from scratch. It’s often best to start by cloning an existing structure application, but if that’s not possible, you’ll just have to make one yourself or hire a consultant to develop one for you.

The core components of a structure application are:

• DTD (Document Type Definition). A set of markup declarations that define the elements and their relationship in an XML or SGML data model. The DTD also defines any attributes and their default values.

• EDD (Element Definition Document). Similar in concept to a DTD, but adds a layer of context rules to allow the mapping of formatting properties to the data model based on the relationship of elements and attribute values. An EDD can be created from a DTD, but the context rules must be added to assign formatting to the document when it is opened. The context rules can assign formatting properties directly, or it can assign paragraph and character styles that are defined in the template.

• Template. A FrameMaker file that defines the page layout properties, named paragraph and character styles, and other document-specific settings. The EDD is imported into the template file, making the template a single file that contains both the structure rules and formatting information.

• Read/write rules. A file that defines additional properties of specific elements and how those elements are modified as the XML file is read from or written to disk.

• XSLT import or export stylesheet. You can optionally include XSLT stylesheets that perform additional processing on the import or export of an XML file.

References to all of these files (and other settings) are included in a structure application definition in the structure application definition file. For details and to learn all that you’ll need, refer to the Structure Application Developer’s Guide (http://www.adobe.com/support/documentation/en/framemaker/).

The nice thing is that once you have the structure application, even if you didn’t create it yourself, you’re likely to be able to make adjustments to the template to affect the layout or formatting of specific elements without assistance from a consultant. This is because you’re just changing properties of a standard FrameMaker template, something that you or someone in your company has probably been doing for years with unstructured FM files. If you’re using an FO-based process, unless you have the necessary expertise in-house, you may need to hire someone to make these modifications. You’ll hear people say that once the template is “set”, you don’t need to worry about further customizations, but that doesn’t mesh with the reality of the publishing process I’ve seen. People are always making little changes.

Another nice thing about using FrameMaker as your PDF publishing tool is the ability to leverage the “generated list” feature for creation of the Table of Contents, Index, and other front or back matter lists. As with the structure application template, setting up a nice looking Table of Contents or Index is just a matter of setting up a generated list template as done with unstructured FrameMaker. No special programming knowledge required, and it’s easy to test and modify as needed.

Publishing from FrameMaker can be done “by hand” on the desktop, by creating a book file from the XML content, then applying the necessary pagination and numbering properties and adding the generated list files. Or you can set up a publishing process that’s partially or completely automated. Because FrameMaker has extensive API support (FDK, ExtendScript, and FrameScript), there are many automation options. This does require purchasing automation add-on components or coding-up your own tools, but much of this can be achieved with minimal expense and/or training.

Both Adobe Technical Communication Suite (TCS) and FrameMaker Server provide a tight integration between FrameMaker and RoboHelp, so in addition to the PDF publishing offered by FrameMaker, you can publish to various types of online Help. This can provide an alternative to using XSL as the method for converting XML into HTML-based output.

When setting up an XML publishing workflow, people are often drawn to XSL and XSL-FO as the means to transform their XML content into online and print deliverables. In some cases one or both of these are in fact the right choice. But if it’s possible that the output formatting will require frequent modifications or if the level of formatting is not sufficient for your needs, FrameMaker is likely to be the best solution.

Because FrameMaker is a standards-compliant XML editor, it can be used in an authoring environment along side other XML editors. FrameMaker can also publish XML content that was authored in other XML editors. The great thing about XML is that it frees your content from being tied to a proprietary authoring or publishing tool. That doesn’t mean you won’t still need to use proprietary tools, you just have the flexibility to mix and match those tools as needed. Your task is to choose the right tools to match your needs. Keep in mind that FrameMaker is not just another XML editor, it might just be the best XML editor for your needs!

– Scott Prentice, President of Leximation, Inc.
Developer of DITA-FMx and FMx-Auto, tools that provide extended DITA authoring and publishing features in FrameMaker.

This article is a quick gist of the import and linking process for Word documents in RoboHelp. The RoboHelp documentation for Importing or linking Microsoft Word Documents has more detailed information.

If you have RoboHelp 9, make sure that you have installed the 9.0.2 patch. This patch includes enhancements that efficiently render images, tables, and styles used in the imported content. For more information, see this post.

Workflow for importing or linking a Word document

The following table describes the workflow for importing or linking a Word document:

Steps to import or link a Word document

The following is a step-by-step illustration of how to import or link a simple Word document into RoboHelp.

1. Click File > New Project and then select a blank project in RoboHelp.
   Note: You can also import the file into an existing project. However, it is prudent to import the file into a new project, clean up the structure, and then copy over the clean structure to your existing project, thus avoiding any mess-up in the existing project.
2. Name your project as you desire and click Finish.
   
3.  Do one of the following depending on whether you want to import or link a Word document.
• To import a Word document: Click File > Import > Word Document. Select the Word document to be imported and click Open.
• To link a Word document: Click File > Link > Word Document. Select the Word document to be linked and click Open.
4. To create a TOC from the Word file, check the Create TOC option. You can either add the imported content to an existing TOC or create a new TOC. Similarly, if your Word document has an index and a glossary, you can choose to import these into RoboHelp.
   
5. Click Next.
6. To edit the conversion settings for the Word document, click Edit.
   
7. In the Conversion Settings dialog box, map the Word styles to RoboHelp styles as desired.  To use the source formatting in RoboHelp, select the mapping as [Source]. Additionally, you can edit the selected RoboHelp style by clicking Edit Style.
   
8. Click OK to save the mapping.
9. Click Finish to finish importing the Word Document into RoboHelp.

 About the converted Word document components

The following table lists the major Word document components and shows how they are converted into RoboHelp.

The Help and Support pages are one-stop shop for hand-picked resources on Adobe products. Bookmark them for easy access.

• FrameMaker Help and Support
• RoboHelp Help and Support
• Technical Communication Suite Help and Support

How do I access the latest Help?

• FrameMaker
• FrameMaker Server
• RoboHelp HTML
• RoboHelp Server
• Technical Communication Suite

Is there a way to save a PDF of any product Help?

From any of the pages of online Help, you can click the View Help PDF link in the top-right corner to download the PDF version of the entire product help (You cannot download just one topic in the help.).

Are there any video resources available?

Plenty of video resources are available on Adobe TV and other sites, such as YouTube. You can search for specific topics on Adobe TV and bookmark videos for quick access. Following are direct links to Technical Communication Suite, FrameMaker, and RoboHelp videos:

• FrameMaker
• RoboHelp
• TCS

What are some popular resources?

FrameMaker Adobe Resources

• S1000D
• DITA Specialization
• Keyboard Shortcuts
• FrameMaker Server
• Adobe FrameMaker Discussion Forum
• FrameMaker 10 Reviewer’s Guide

• Framers  - An email list for FrameMaker discussions
• FrameMaker 9 Tutorials
• FrameMaker 10 Training on Lynda.com

TCS resources

• Technical Communication Suite 3 Reviewer’s Guide
• TCS User Roles
• Enterprise User case scenarios: Scenario 1, Scenario 2, Scenario 3
• Adobe Technical Communication Suite 3.5 Datasheet

Sure! Your contributions are welcome. All you need is an Adobe ID and the Community Publishing System app. See the link for more information:

http://www.adobe.com/community/publishing/download.html

Information about the Scripts :

• ZIP file contains script file and sample .ini files. RestoreWin.jsx loads the menu and calls the function to execute the work flow. All function definition is present in this script file.
• The script works on FM/MIF document in both structured and un-structured FrameMaker.
• Script creates two initialization files AutoRestore.ini and Restore.ini in AppData location.
• Script creates a new menu “Restore Window” which has three commands “Save Current State”, “Restore State” and “Auto-Restore”.
• “Save Current State” command saves the display and zoom settings of active document in Restore.ini. It always delete the previously saved settings and re-create .ini file.
• “Restore State” command retrieves the saved settings and apply on the active document.
• “Auto-Restore” command toggles the automatic restoring On and Off. When enabled, saved window settings will get applied on active document automatically.

Steps to Install :

• Download the zip file from Restore Window
• UnZip the file and Place “RestoreWin.jsx in startup folder located at “C:\Program Files\Adobe\AdobeFrameMaker10\startup”

How to use the Script?

• Launch FrameMaker
• Open a Frame document
• New menu “Restore Window” will get created with three commands.
• Click on “Save Current State” to save the current display settings.
• Click on “Restore State” to apply the saved settings on active document.
• Click on “Auto-Restore” to toggle On/Off auto-restore functionality.

I hope this will prove useful to many folks and you can add extra functionality as per your requirements to these scripts to make it even more powerful

Regards,
Navneet Goyal
FrameMaker Engineering Team

(Resources: Restore Window )

Our social media presence is growing by the day and we notice no one throngs and thrives on the social media as well as the #techcomm superjocks. So the first big news of 2012 (implying many more are to follow) is that we have entered the new year with a new look Facebook community! We intend to build the social networks’ largest community of technical communication professionals and the foundation has been laid.

Some interesting content that already exists on the community page / will soon be available, includes:

• Video interviews with seasoned technical communication professionals, thought leaders, acclaimed industry experts talking about trends in the TechComm space
• Competitions that will engage the technical writing world like never before (with very, very interesting prizes!)
• Technical Communication humor and cartoon strips
• What’s happening in the TechComm world and what we did / noticed at all major events across the globe in FY 2011
• Surprise goodies like the Technical Writers’ Calendar and much more (can’t let the cat out of the bag yet)
• Announcements of webinars by Adobe and prominent guests from across the industry
• Direct relay from our Twitter and YouTube channels, free training videos from the Technical Communication CHANNEL on Adobe TV
• Other information such as Adobe product promotions, special offers, discounts, events

Now, join us on Facebook right away or shall we shoot more bullet points your way? Also, do tell your friends and colleagues!

We hope to see you there soon!

To interesting times,

Team TechComm @ Adobe