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23JUN2001
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© 2000 TechKnowledge Corp.
Converting Between Word and Frame
Introduction
Many writers break into a sweat at the thought of converting large files between
Word and FrameMaker. It turns out, however, that with some preparation, the
process can nearly fly in either direction.
Most of the rules and guidelines for painless conversions apply to either situation
(Word > Frame or Frame > Word); to that end, I tried to write as much of this as
I could using generic terms like source (the file being converted) and target (what
the file is being converted to). Also, while this guide is indeed a “how-to” on “how
to make conversion easier,” it is not a how-to on how to perform individual tasks.
For example, this guide will tell you to remove Word’s automatic numbering, but
it will not tell you how to actually go about doing it. It is your responsibility to be
fluent enough in Frame and Word to perform the necessary tasks.
The process described herein is valid for Word 97 and 2000 (differences noted
when I’m aware of them), and FrameMaker 5 and 6, running under Windows 98
Second Edition. I have not done a lot of conversions on Macintosh, but from the
few I’ve done I’ve found the processes are the same.
When I think of new things to add I will post a new document at the web site, so
check back once in a while and see if it’s been updated. I’m open to suggestions,
too. Finally, do you remember the robot Ash from the movie Alien? Remember
when his severed head said, “you have my sympathies?” Turns out they asked
him about doing serious documents in Word.
A summary
It’s the dream of many that one should be able to convert between these programs
just as is. They think, “if the filters were any good, I could just convert from one
to the other straight away.” In a perfect world, that would be the case, but it’s not
a perfect world, so you’re going to have to massage your document to get it ready
for the ordeal. This causes a lot of concern for many people because they think
that the task of preparing the source for the conversion is destroying it. Well, it is,
in a way, but you’re leaving it to the target to put it back together.
It turns out that if you really know Frame and Word, the following sentence may
be all you need and you don’t even have to read the rest of this document: The goal
is to get your source document to look nearly like a plain-text document yet retain
its style names, which will be matched up with target styles or tags later, and
letting the target application do the things it does best. That’s it. Really. If you
need more info, read on. . . .
Tim Murray
TechKnowledge Corp.
www.TechKnowledgeCorp.com
TLMurray@TechKnowledgeCorp.com
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Converting Between Word and Frame
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File formats
In the direction of Frame > Word, some find they like the “save as Microsoft RTF”
or “save as Japanese RTF” approach, but if the file is prepared properly, I’ll bet
my last dollar that saving as a Word document will provide better results. If the
save takes all night or crashes, then, in my experience, the file wasn’t prepared
properly. The same is true for Word > Frame: you could save your Word file as an
RTF and then import that, but I think that a regular .doc format is better.
Therefore, this entire document assumes that if you’re converting from Frame to
Word, your will use a “save as Microsoft Word”; if you’re converting from Word to
Frame, then you’re either doing an open or an import in Frame of a regular Word
.doc file.
General preparation of the source file
Anything in this section is universal for either direction.
1
Manage your styles and tags.
As often as possible, use like-named styles in both applications. In fact, with the
exception of matching Word’s default Normal with Frame’s default Body, there is
little reason to have disparity in style names. See also “The target template” on
page 8.
The less styles or tags a converted file has, the easier it will be to work with, so
you will also want to remove styles or tags that are unused and merge those that
are very similar. Later, if you find that you need extra styles or tags, you can add
them.
2
Kill the table of contents.
Because Frame does such an excellent job of TOCs, there is no reason at all to
keep anything in Word having to do with a TOC, whether the TOC is a separate
document or a section of a file. If you’ve use Word bookmarks to generate a TOC,
delete them all. And since Word sucks so bad at TOCs and it will be necessary to
do it later anyway, don’t even bother trying to make a Frame TOC into something
Word can use; just make a fresh TOC in Word.
3
Remove headers and footers.
There is little hope of having them appear in the target as you want anyway, so
just plan on doing them from scratch. Both programs do things differently in
terms of automatic contents.
4
Remove local paragraph overrides.
Hopefully, local overrides were done only occasionally.
• Word: Select the entire document and press Ctrl+Q.
• Frame: One way is to use Import > Formats and take the option for removing
overrides. Another way is to select a few key paragraphs (one at a time, of
course), open the Paragraph Designer, and do an update all, choosing remove
overrides whenever it appears.
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Converting Between Word and Frame
4
• Word. If the author used negative indents for headings and the body is at
zero, make the headings zero (results will look like left image). If positive
indents were used for the body, then make the body zero (right).
• Frame. Frame doesn’t do negative indents, so chances are the headings were
done using side heads. Make all paragraphs (column-spanning, side-head,
etc.) into regular in-column paragraphs, then change your master pages to not
use any side head at all. (See also the next item.) Do the paragraph changes
before the master page change because any you missed will be easier to catch.
7
Remove things the target program can’t interpret.
• Word: Remove borders, WordArt, callout boxes, arrows, text frames, etc. Text
frames are commonly used to do what Frame would call a side head. If you
want to retain the text, you will need to copy it into the regular flow.
• Frame: Remove frames above/below and Frame-drawn art. Convert variables
to text (you’ll get the converted text anyway, but I just like to do this because
it’s less work on the filter). For cross-references, see “Cross-references” on
page 6. Convert all types of anchored frames to either “at insertion point” or
“below current line”.
8
Save the source file.
When you save your cleaned source file . . .
• Word: Make sure the option Allow Fast Saves is turned off, or, better yet, save
the file as a totally new file (but generally speaking, Allow Fast Saves should
be turned off anyway).
• Frame: Remember to place a .doc extension on the saved file, or else you’ll
blow away your .fm file.
Master pages and sections
Although master pages (Frame) and sections (Word) are not the same constructs,
they are frequently used for the same purpose: To impart a page layout that is in
some way different from the rest of the document.
Word to Frame
In Word, sections are frequently used to insert changes in headers and footers,
such as when a header reflects the chapter name. Since you’ll be doing things
differently in Frame anyway (as in breaking chapters into files), remove all
section breaks (search for ^b).
Frame to Word
Apply the regular L/R master pages to the whole file, then remove the custom
masters. (Technically you don’t have to remove the masters, but I just do it
anyway because that’s the way I am.)
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Converting Between Word and Frame
5
Headings in general
Word to Frame
Frame could care less if a heading is named Heading 1 or Fred_Flintstone, so you
don’t really have to mess with Word’s style names before the conversion unless
you want to change the style names to match the target template.
Frame to Word
You probably know that Word gives special treatment to paragraphs with certain
names, particularly the headings of Heading n. In other words, Word can deal
with Heading 1 much differently than it can Fred_Flintstone. Your knowledge of
Word and the kind of numbering or cross-referencing you expect to do later will
determine if you want to change Frame’s heading names before the conversion. Of
course, you can do a find-and-replace later.
Numbering
Word to Frame
If you come across a Word document that uses a great deal of automatic
numbering and where the numbering is based on styles, that is a good thing:
Simply blow away the numbers (but not the styles) in Word, and don’t worry if
things look like crap after you do. Later, when Frame opens the file, you can
attach a template with numbering applied and find your numbering is pretty
much done for you. You will probably have to do some resetting to 1 and so on, but
that’s cake in Frame.
In contrast, you might leave the numbers in a Word document that’s been poorly
done. That is because later, in Frame, the bullets and numbers will give you some-
thing to find ([0-9], for example) and change (paste an autonumbered tag).
Frame to Word
I’m not going to even bother with this section. The reason is that so much depends
on how you’ll do it in Word. You might use SEQ fields, autonumbers assigned to
headings, or simply do the numbering yourself. I will simply leave it to you to
figure out the best way to do it.
If you want to experiment, first give a shot to leaving the numbering in the Frame
document. If it helps when it gets to Word, then great. If it doesn’t or it makes
things worse, then take it out and put it back in later, in Word.
Bullets
Word to Frame
Like numbering, bullets were hopefully done with styles and not manual over-
rides. If styles were used, then keep the style names but remove the bullet from
the definition. When the file gets put into Frame, the bullets themselves should
appear as a result of Frame’s numbering.
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Converting Between Word and Frame
6
If the bullets were done using overrides or were typed in by hand, you might find
your imported paragraphs contain two bullets—one that’s defined by the Frame
tag, and one that was simply picked up during the import. If you have extras, copy
a good bullet tag to the clipboard, then search for a bullet followed by a tab and
replace with a paste. Follow up with another find & change and delete the extra
bullets and tabs.
Frame to Word
Word tends to maintain bullets pretty well. You may have to mess with the
default font and size of the bullet, but in many cases, you should find the Word
style is defined as you want.
Cross-references
If you know Word, then you know that it can only make a cross-reference to some-
thing in the same file—it can’t look inside another file like Frame can.
Word to Frame
When Frame reads a Word file with cross-references, they are usually main-
tained. However, what you get is a rather odd marker like “_Ref473865239”. You
could leave it a that and get the job done, but maintenance in the long run could
be a chore. Therefore, you may want to strip them out of Word before the conver-
sion and redo them later.
Frame to Word
What you get depends on the reference. A Frame reference like “See Cross-refer-
ences on page 5” might end up in Word as “See Cross-references on page 1” with
an odd character style applied to the heading name. I’m not sure why this
happens, but it seems that Word will update a change to the heading name
correctly but the page number is almost always incorrect. For example, if you
change the heading (let’s say it’s really on page 5) to from “Cross-references” to
“Making Cross-refs”, Word will update its cross-reference to “See Making Cross-
refs on page 2”. Where the heck it gets page 2 is beyond me, except that the page
number seems to be the page where the cross-reference resides, not the book-
mark.
The fact that an odd character style is applied could be used to your advantage: It
will give you something to look for on screen as you page through the Word
version.
Another oddity I’ve found is that when the Frame-exported file is opened in Word,
you find that a section break has been inserted just before the actual reference;
for example, you might end up with something like “See [section break] Cross-
references on page 1”.
Indexes
I have found that both programs can read the other program’s index markers
okay. I have not really done a lot of conversions of indexes with multiple levels, so
that’s about all I can say.
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Converting Between Word and Frame
8
4. Close the dialog box, return to the document, and paste the text next to the
figure or in its own paragraph immediately above or below the old location.
5. Delete the figure’s frame.
What you’ve done is removed the graphic but kept the file name on the page. Now,
when you begin doing new graphic imports, you’ll save a ton of time because you
have the graphic file name right there on the page.
It also turns out that when you go from Frame 6 to Word 97, all graphics, whether
linked or embedded, turn out as floating graphics. That, in an of itself, might be
reason enough to kill the graphics before the conversion. From Frame 6 to Word
2000, they (thankfully) end up as in-line graphics.
Tables
Word to Frame
“Unspan” spanned columns.
A spanned column can come into Frame about one
pica wide and thus screw things up. Just remove the spans, then add them back
in later.
A note about heading rows.
Oddly, Frame does not detect the presence of a
heading row in Word. One solution is to use Word (no, seriously) to process the
Frame MIF. At the end of this document is text you can use as a Word macro to
convert the top row of all tables into a header row. But note that if it encounters
a table that already has a header, it will take the first nonheader row and make
a header row out of it, so you’ll have two.
Frame to Word
I’ve found tables in the direction of Frame to Word work a bit better than Word to
Frame; about all you’ll have to mess with are spanned cells: From Frame 5, Word
sees horizontally spanned cells not vertically spanned; from Frame 6, Word sees
both.
Books and master documents
Work on a file-by-file basis. Join them up later or make as book as needed. Never
use Word’s Master Document feature. It’s junk, and it’s even worse in Word 2000.
The target template
When you open or import the source file into the target application, you’re going
to want to get it looking good—close to the final layout—as soon as possible. The
best way to do this (in my opinion) is to prepare a template that has the styles or
tags you’ll be using.
One question to answer is whether to use similar style or tag names or use a
completely new set. Personally, I prefer the former because there is less manual
labor, but this is a matter of personal preference.
42
Converting Between Word and Frame
9
You may want to assign the target’s template to the target file both before and
after you do these next final fixes.
Final Frame fixes
Word to Frame
At this point you’ve opened or imported your prepared Word document in Frame.
1
Remove and combine unwanted character and paragraph tags.
After you’ve opened a Word document in Frame, you may find that you’ve gained
an unwanted character tag called Default Paragraph Font (Frame already has
one called Default ¶ Font). When you remove a tag from Frame’s catalog, that is
indeed all you’ve accomplished—if it’s been assigned to text, it’s still assigned to
text. The only way to actually remove it from text is to either select the text and
choose Default ¶ Font (your goal nine times out of 10), assign it something else, or
save the file as a MIF and delete all occurrences of the string “Default Paragraph
Font” minus the quotes. The latter method is very fast.
Many times in Word documents I find the author has created numerous styles
that look nearly identical, so you may want to make them all the same tag to
start, and add any special tags later if you really need them. Combining tags is
easy in Frame. First, let’s assume you have three tags—T1, T2, and T3—and you
want T2 and T3 to be named, and to look like, T1.
1. Make sure the target template has a T1 that’s just as you like it and that does
not have a T2 or T3.
2. In the file to be changed, click inside a T2 paragraph, then open the Para-
graph Designer.
3. Change the name to T1. Don’t use the pull-down arrow; instead, type right
over it.
4. Choose Update All. When Frame asks if you want to change all T2 to T1,
answer yes.
5. Do the same for T3: change it to T1.
6. Delete T2 and T3 from the catalog, if they are still lingering.
7. Open the file from step 1, and import its paragraph catalog. I would also sug-
gest taking the option to remove overrides.
Experienced Framers know that you can get around bothering with the import.
However, it’s sort of a safety net for the new folks.
2
Remove custom table ruling and shading.
Even when the Word table does not have what appears to be custom settings,
Frame can assign custom settings to the table. There is a way to remove these
custom settings from the entire document in a flash.
1. Select the entire document.
47
Converting Between Word and Frame
10
2. Choose Table > Custom Ruling & Shading.
3. Select both of the “From Table” settings, and
select all check boxes.
4. Click Apply.
The reason why this works is that selecting the
table anchors is sufficient to select the tables.
Frame to Word
1
Remove section breaks.
Seems like Word loves section breaks . . . when it reads a doc file saved from
Frame, it has a tendency to slap them down all over the place. Remove them
globally then add them back in where you need them.
2
Combine similar tags.
In Word, you can use the find/replace. You find text of one format and replace with
another.
3
Remove unwanted tags.
Word works a bit differently than Frame when you remove a style. When you
delete a style, Word reassigns the Normal style to any paragraph that was
assigned the style you just deleted. This can be very handy, however, in cases
where the author had used a number of paragraph tags that were similar—close
enough to at least start out as Normal, in any case.
If you don’t want to reset them to Normals, use several finds (of the similar para-
graph styles) and replaces (with style you want). Remove the style after you’ve
changed them all.
FrameMaker Tools
There are some very useful (and sometimes free or inexpensive) tools out there to
help with some of the Frame cleanup, both before and after the conversion.
Archive collects the files in a book and other files it references (graphics, for
example), and makes a copy in a separate location. E-mail the fellow directly at
bruce_foster@compuserve.com
.
Remove Local Formatting strips local overrides from a file or from a selection,
sort of like Word’s Ctrl+Q and Ctrl+Space. Clean Import deletes all paragraph
and character tag names, table definitions, cross-reference formats, conditional
text tags, master pages, reference pages from the current document, then allows
you to select formats from a selected template.
Source: http://www.electropubs.com
Hunt Overrides from Chris Despopoulos of CudSpan generates a view-only
window with a list of paragraph overrides on body pages. Click an item in the list
to jump to the corresponding paragraph. His DoBatch utility does some extra
useful book-wide functions presently not provided by Frame.
Source: http://www.telecable.es/personales/cud/
.
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