Subject: Re: Congrats for this list

Mike Smith wrote:

>Well, I'm a technical writer working for a Hewlett-Packard
>subsidiary in Austin, Texas that makes distributed output
>management software. ...
.
.
.
>I started XML-DOC not only to give technical writers a forum for
>focused discussions about XML topics, ...

Many hurrahs.!

I've started tech writing 20 years ago, moved into a number of other roles
and for the last five years have been back in tech writing.   I wrote my
first manual with an ASCII editor on a Digital VAX.  The text was
transferred to a Compugraphic typesetter and pasted up and laid out by a
document preparation group.  Personally I look forward to XML freeing us
from the tyranny of WYSIWYG GUIs like MS Word or Framemaker.  I hope to move
to working on the source with editors like Homesite or FrontPage and leave
the layout and format to the style sheet folks.  Hopefully XML will allow us
to return to focusing on the content.

Later,
Steve MacDonald
Aspect Communications, Inc.

Hi,
I'm quite new in the XML-Community but now I have to care about
something like Content Management based on XML.
As we have in our company a lot of DB2 installations I would be
interested if anyone has experience in the DB2 XML Extender. We think
about implementing on top of it, something like an own middleware in
order to provide facilities to retrieve an combine various types of
documentation consiting out of portions of existing documentation.

Thanks

Joerg

hello.

i'm new this list, and i look forward to communicating, perhaps to
collaborating. ( note: http://www.sourceforge.net is a great place for spawning
any would-be projects . instant CVS + bug-reporting + "and then some" . )


here's a suggestion:

someone needs to integrate expat with xemacs.



native-coded xml-handling, with elisp access, on the xemacs
application-platform. would this not be a neat thing?

[ and could it not be a great testbed for new xml-related technologies? ]

( wishing i could handle this myself, yet.  C++ will take the purchasing, and
studying, of some reference-books. and the work of making sure that i keep it
cleanly seperated from java, in "the info-flooded ol' noggin". )


...and i might be able to start hacking on this now, but with elisp and java
already on the table, and an xml + xsl knowledge that still needs plenty of
polish (along with the rest), .... whee.




and if i can ever get around to building a classpath-manager with elisp, for the
xemacs platform (21.1.9 is what's installed, here. the ms-windows build. linux
is still a ways away), this should be a help for folks who would like to try
some java+emacs integration. xslide already has this, to an extent. (has some
sort of a function to call xt with the current buffer-contents, or something
like that. for the href, please try a search for 'xslide' @ google.com ) . JDE
(Java Development Environment ... also for emacs, x [or otherwise]? ) comes with
BeanShell, and probably a wealth of other things that i haven't dug into yet. (
a wariness of info-flood prevails, yet. ) ( for JDE, please look somewhere at
http://www.xemacs.org , probably under an href with the text "packages" in it. )



so that's a report from this work-bench.


how's it going elsewhere?


-- s.c.

Thank you to those who responded to my post about converting from FrameMaker
to a structured Frame SGML document, with the original docs in Word. I got
some good advice, some of which was above my head! I can tell I'll be
learning a lot in the next few months.

Shelley

----- Original Message ----- > >
> > Hi all,
> >
> > A question on the conversion of unstructured FrameMaker docs to
structured
> > SGML docs: How goes it?
> >
> > We have several docs, one 700 pages with multiple (actually, thousands
of)
> > tables, currently in Word. We are converting them to Frame. We just got
> > Frame + SGML, however. We need these docs converted to Frame ASAP, so
are
> > wondering if we first do the Word to (unstructured) Frame conversion,
and
> > then later take on the task of wrapping the doc in elements, are we
creating
> > a huge amount of work for ourselves by not converting everything to
> > structured SGML at once? What is the complexity and difficulty of
converting
> > long unstructured Frame docs to structured ones?
> >
> > Thanks,
> >
> > Shelley
> >
> > Shelley Hoose
> > Technical Writer
> > A-Frame Software
> > shelley@...
> > 707.823-4083x11
> >
> > ________________________________________________________________________
> > ________________________________________________________________________
>
> --
> _______________________________________________________
> Marie-Françoise Godard
> Open Text Corporation (France)
> http://www.opentext.com
> _______________________________________________________
>
>
>
>
>
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Hi,

I'm looking for information concerning EDI-applications using XML.
- Do such applications exist?
- Experiences?
- References to literature, publications, ...

Thanks,

Eric

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Download your XML parser generator from
http://www.xmlbooster.com/

On Monday, July 03, 2000, Graham Wyatt wrote:

> --- In xml-doc@egroups.com, Michael Smith <smith@i...> wrote:
> > WordPerfect 9 has sometimes been recommended (in Usenet groups
> > and elsewhere) as an easy-to-use, cheap ($150) alternative to
> > high-end XML authoring applications. For one perspective on
> > its XML capabilities, read "XML in WordPerfect 9: A User's
> > View" at:
> >
> >    http://www.xml.com/pub/2000/05/31/wordperfect/index2.html
>
> Michael,
>
> Its an interesting article. Do you have any experience of using Corel
> Ventura?
>
> Version 8 has a (very well hidden) SGML import feature. I've not
> tried it, but it seems to map SGML tags to pre-defined Ventura style
> tags. As far as I can see, there is no export path, but I'm
> interested because it looks as if Ventura could provide a low cost
> alternative to Frame as a way of outputting XML docs for print or PDF.

I haven't had any experience with Ventura at all, but it's
encouraging to see that Corel has been consistent about
incorporating XML/SGML capabilities into its products. Hopefully
it will get to the point where most software vendors developing
products for this market routinely build in some level of XML/SGML
compatibility into their applications.

Regarding tools for going from XML to PDF/print: I think the
perfect tool is one that's completely automatic; you feed it an
XML document and an XSL stylesheet, and it gives you back a
nice-looking PostScript or PDF file -- you never need to do any
manual formatting to get what you want.

However, until those kinds of publishing solutions become more
affordable, I'm sure that applications like Ventura (and
others like Jade/Openjade) will continue to be widely used for
going from XML to the printed page.

   -- Mike Smith

--
Michael Smith         ...  xml-doc-owner@egroups.com
Moderator
XML-DOC mailing list  ...  http://www.egroups.com/group/xml-doc/

On Sunday, July 02, 2000, Guru Kamath wrote:

> My congratulations to you for starting this list.  I think it would be
> appropriate if you'd give a small introduction about yourself -- as this
> list is just starting. Perhaps, if you maintain a small site, your
> introduction can be featured there too.

Well, I'm a technical writer working for a Hewlett-Packard
subsidiary in Austin, Texas that makes distributed output
management software. (For anyone who might be curious, I'm also
responsible for a Web site -- www.logopoeia.com -- that focuses on
literature and computer-generated poetry. The Emily Dickinson
Random Epigram Machine -- www.logopoeia.com/ed/ -- is something I
put together a while back.)

I started XML-DOC not only to give technical writers a forum for
focused discussions about XML topics, but also to give XML
developers and product vendors a clear point of contact with the
technical writing/documentation community.

I'm hoping that XML-DOC will build awareness and communication on
both sides; that is, I hope that (1) it will help to promote XML
"inside" -- among documentation professionals -- and (2) it will
also reach outside, to the greater XML community, and help
developers, product vendors, and so on better understand what kind
of XML tools and information technical communicators really need.


    -- Mike Smith

--
Michael Smith         ...  xml-doc-owner@egroups.com
Moderator
XML-DOC mailing list  ...  http://www.egroups.com/group/xml-doc/

Peter Flynn has made available for preview the 1.6 (beta) version
of the XML FAQ <http://www.ucc.ie/xml/>, scheduled for public
release on 21 July 2000.


--
Michael Smith         ...  xml-doc-owner@egroups.com
Moderator
XML-DOC mailing list  ...  http://www.egroups.com/group/xml-doc/

For a first-hand account of an extremely successful structured
markup project, take a look at the following article written by
Laura Elliot of the Oxford English Dictionary Online.

   http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue24/oed-tech/

Some words of advice she offers are especially encouraging:

    An issue which may be more relevant to you is that for all my
    advocacy of generalized markup language as an excellent basis
    for online publication, you may have heard that SGML and XML
    are expensive options which can only be afforded by well-funded
    or commercial enterprises. I can see where this view comes
    from. For example, SGML software suppliers and consultants have
    historically worked for government departments (largely defence
    departments), huge engineering contractors (famously Boeing,
    which put its technical documentation into SGML), large
    healthcare operations and global publishing corporations: these
    organizations could absorb charges out of the reach of many
    librarians and smaller (or more parsimonious) publishers.

    However, if you can see the value of marking up your content to
    a standard set of rules, with the advantages for web
    publication that I've described, then nowadays the PC-based
    software to allow you to do this (from suppliers such as
    SoftQuad and ArbotText) is not ruinously expensive. In the ten
    years that I've been involved in publishing using SGML and
    similar coding systems, it has become understood that this need
    not be the preserve of highly technical experts.

    Freelance editors have gradually begun to branch into SGML and
    XML, coping without dozens of technical support staff. HTML has
    helped here: that's something in which many of us dabble,
    whether "raw" or in the context of FrontPage or DreamWeaver.
    The skills needed to encode in SGML or XML are in the same
    league: the added ingredient necessary is real understanding of
    the structure of the text, but that is not usually all that
    complicated. You may have a great deal to gain by branching out
    into SGML or XML to record the underlying intellectual
    structure of your documents for online publication, something
    that HTML simply can't do for you.



--
Michael Smith         ...  xml-doc-owner@egroups.com
Moderator
XML-DOC mailing list  ...  http://www.egroups.com/group/xml-doc/

Hello,

I did have an experience in the past from Word to SGML (not with framemaker), I
would advise you to work as much as possible on the word documents:

1- You will find more people to help you in word than in SGML
2- If you convert them now, it will be difficult for you to retrieve problems
and you will need to look back at the word document anyway.
3- you should try to convert some of the documents, find common problems (like
"if the style is named xxx", it does not convert correctly), correct this type
of problem on all the word documents (use macros), you will save some time.

Bon courage

Marie
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>
> There is 1 message in this issue.
>
> Topics in this digest:
>
>       1. FrameMaker and SGML question
>            From: "Shelley Hoose" <shelley@...>
>
> ________________________________________________________________________
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 1
>    Date: Wed, 5 Jul 2000 08:14:38 -0700
>    From: "Shelley Hoose" <shelley@...>
> Subject: FrameMaker and SGML question
>
> Hi all,
>
> A question on the conversion of unstructured FrameMaker docs to structured
> SGML docs: How goes it?
>
> We have several docs, one 700 pages with multiple (actually, thousands of)
> tables, currently in Word. We are converting them to Frame. We just got
> Frame + SGML, however. We need these docs converted to Frame ASAP, so are
> wondering if we first do the Word to (unstructured) Frame conversion, and
> then later take on the task of wrapping the doc in elements, are we creating
> a huge amount of work for ourselves by not converting everything to
> structured SGML at once? What is the complexity and difficulty of converting
> long unstructured Frame docs to structured ones?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Shelley
>
> Shelley Hoose
> Technical Writer
> A-Frame Software
> shelley@...
> 707.823-4083x11
>
> ________________________________________________________________________
> ________________________________________________________________________

--
_______________________________________________________
Marie-Françoise Godard
Open Text Corporation (France)
http://www.opentext.com
_______________________________________________________

A quick response to Shelly Hoose.

I know nothing about Word to Frame or Frame to SGML, but we have had a very
good experience going from Word RTF straight to SGML.

We have just converted 4,000 maintenance routines (the longest about 40
pages but most contain some kind of table, and some contain some very
complex multi page tables with spans) from WordPerfect (exported as RTF)
directly into SGML using an RTF and XML/SGML aware scripting tool called
ACE. My understanding is that public domain Perl and Python scripting
languages also have XML libraries. Although ACE is an integral part of
RMIT's Structured Information Manager (SIM - http://www.simdb.com) most of
the ACE language is available as a free download over the Web:
http://io.mds.rmit.edu.au:7250/adl (see
http://www.simdb.com/simdb%20content%2FAbout%20SIM%2FComponents%2FAce for
more detail on the language).

The most surprising thing about our experience is that the tables converted
like a dream. Most don't even require reformatting after the WordPerfect ->
RTF -> fully CALS compliant SGML tables.

We haven't tried the conversion from a styled FM document to SGML, and don't
want to think about it where tables are concerned because this would
probably require some deep understanding of FM's proprietary internal
structure. (or perhaps you would go via MIF?). Anyway, RTF is published and
at least SIM's ACE fully understands it, so for us conversion turned out to
be one of the easier parts of our implementation exercise.

A question you must ask if you are considering this approach is how well
structured the documents are in their present Word state. If they are done
with all kinds of inconsistent styles and overrides they are likely to be a
mess however you do it. In that case you are probably better off doing the
conversions handraulically from Word to SGML using cut and paste at the
level of individual paragraph levels.

Bill Hall
Documentation Systems Specialist
Integrated Logistic Support
Naval Projects and Support
Tenix Defence Systems Pty Ltd
Williamstown, Vic. 3016 AUSTRALIA
Email: bill.hall@... <mailto:bill.hall@...>


------------
Message: 1
    Date: Wed, 5 Jul 2000 08:14:38 -0700
    From: "Shelley Hoose" <shelley@...>
Subject: FrameMaker and SGML question

Hi all,

A question on the conversion of unstructured FrameMaker docs to structured
SGML docs: How goes it?

We have several docs, one 700 pages with multiple (actually, thousands of)
tables, currently in Word. We are converting them to Frame. We just got
Frame + SGML, however. We need these docs converted to Frame ASAP, so are
wondering if we first do the Word to (unstructured) Frame conversion, and
then later take on the task of wrapping the doc in elements, are we creating
a huge amount of work for ourselves by not converting everything to
structured SGML at once? What is the complexity and difficulty of converting
long unstructured Frame docs to structured ones?

Thanks,

Shelley

Shelley Hoose
Technical Writer
A-Frame Software
shelley@...
707.823-4083x11



________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________

Hi all,

A question on the conversion of unstructured FrameMaker docs to structured
SGML docs: How goes it?

We have several docs, one 700 pages with multiple (actually, thousands of)
tables, currently in Word. We are converting them to Frame. We just got
Frame + SGML, however. We need these docs converted to Frame ASAP, so are
wondering if we first do the Word to (unstructured) Frame conversion, and
then later take on the task of wrapping the doc in elements, are we creating
a huge amount of work for ourselves by not converting everything to
structured SGML at once? What is the complexity and difficulty of converting
long unstructured Frame docs to structured ones?

Thanks,

Shelley

Shelley Hoose
Technical Writer
A-Frame Software
shelley@...
707.823-4083x11

On Friday, June 30, 2000, Lynnea Clark wrote:

> I want to use several entities in my XML document: em dash (—),
> left quote (“), and right quote (”), for example.
>
> Because these are not predefined entities included in the XML
> specification, I have tried defining them im the DOCTYPE declaration.
> But no luck. The problem seems to be that the contents of the entity
> being defined can't start with an ampersand (&). Entity contents
> work just fine when they are straight alpha text.
>
> Does anyone know how I can make this work using entities?

Are you making sure to quote the replacement characters in your
entity declarations? That is,

   <!ENTITY name "replacementCharacter">

The only other thing I can think to suggest is to make sure that
if your document contains an XML declaration, it's either simply

   <?xml version="1.0"?>

    or

   <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

You'd want to be sure, for example, that it's not
encoding="ISO-8859-1", because those characters are not part of
the ISO-8859-1 (Latin 1) character set.

If none of that helps, you probably want to try posting your
question, along with whatever other details you can provide,
either to the comp.text.xml Usenet newsgroup, or to the XML-L
mailing list.

     -- Mike Smith

--
Michael Smith         ...  xml-doc-owner@egroups.com
Moderator
XML-DOC mailing list  ...  http://www.egroups.com/group/xml-doc/

On Friday, June 30, 2000, Ian Saunders wrote:

> I'll get the ball rolling with a question about the above, as
> this is exactly what my team are proposing to do. I hope it is
> not too lame or vague to elicit some useful responses:
>
> Is it possible to do this with vanilla FrameMaker, or must we
> migrate to FM+SGML?

It's not possible with plain old FrameMaker, but you don't
necessarily have to move to Frame+SGML.

You'll find that that there are plenty of XML editing tools to
consider -- some of them quite expensive and powerful and designed
to do things like integrate with (equally expensive)
content/document management systems, and others that are
relatively inexpensive (or even free) but not nearly as limited in
features as you might expect for the price.

On the XML-DOC links page, http://www.egroups.com/links/xml-doc/ ,
I plan to add a few links to some of the free/inexpensive tools.
For many projects and organizations, it seems like starting out
with one of these cheaper, slightly more limited tools might make
the transition a little smoother

> Also, are there any tools available that will let us extract
> only certain tagged information from FM+SGML documents to
> achieve single-sourcing. You can't do this with Frame, correct?

Two ways to do what you describe with a FM+SGML document -- or
with any XML/SGML document:

   * an XSLT (XSL transformations) stylesheet and an XSL engine
   * a DSSSL stylesheet and a DSSSL engine

In this case, you'd be relying more on the "transforming"
side of XSL/DSSL -- as opposed to the formatting or styling
side -- to select the parts of the document you need.

You can do some of that kind of selection/extraction "single
sourcing" in plain FrameMaker by using their own built-in (that
is, proprietary) "conditional text" feature. For what it is, it
works very well -- but it doesn't provide anything like the level
of flexibility, portability, potential for automation, etc. of the
XML/SGML solutions.

    -- Mike Smith


--
Michael Smith         ...  xml-doc-owner@egroups.com
Moderator
XML-DOC mailing list  ...  http://www.egroups.com/group/xml-doc/

Self-described "XML troublemaker" Simon St. Laurent has made
available his notes for a presentation, titled "XML for Small
Projects and Small Organizations: Scaling Down a Powerful Tool,"
which he delivered at XMLDevCon 2000.

    http://www.simonstl.com/articles/smdev/smdev.html

Although the notes don't provide much depth of detail, hopefully
St. Laurent has plans to work them into an article for
publication later. The topic seems like one that's going to have
a lot of relevance to an increasing number of people.

   -- Mike Smith


--
Michael Smith         ...  xml-doc-owner@egroups.com
Moderator
XML-DOC mailing list  ...  http://www.egroups.com/group/xml-doc/

--- In xml-doc@egroups.com, Michael Smith <smith@i...> wrote:
> WordPerfect 9 has sometimes been recommended (in Usenet groups and
> elsewhere) as an easy-to-use, cheap ($150) alternative to high-end
> XML authoring applications. For one perspective on its XML
> capabilities, read "XML in WordPerfect 9: A User's View" at:
>
>    http://www.xml.com/pub/2000/05/31/wordperfect/index2.html

Michael,

Its an interesting article. Do you have any experience of using Corel
Ventura?

Version 8 has a (very well hidden) SGML import feature. I've not
tried it, but it seems to map SGML tags to pre-defined Ventura style
tags. As far as I can see, there is no export path, but I'm
interested because it looks as if Ventura could provide a low cost
alternative to Frame as a way of outputting XML docs for print or PDF.

I have to add that, like many people here, I am new to XML, and am
trying to evaluate it and find some reasonably user friendly way of
using it.

Graham Wyat

Hello Mike,

My congratulations to you for starting this list.  I think it would be
appropriate if you'd give a small introduction about yourself -- as this
list is just starting. Perhaps, if you maintain a small site, your
introduction can be featured there too.

I am a technical writer based in Mumbai, India, and am very keen to learn
and use XML.  In India, we are doing a lot of XML coding. Basically, this is
hand coding (through say Notepad) of XML. I have a feeling that very few
people must be using tools like Frame+SGML.

I just bought the book Learn XML in 21 days by Simon North and a co-author
and am looking forward to reading it.

Incidentally, I had prepared an introductory presentation on XML for a
company for a half-day seminar. It took me some 7-10 days to prepare it. I
searched the web extensively for material and my material is based on this
research.  Then the company said that it did not want the introductory
seminar on XML! (They had no clue what XML was!)

I really appreciate your efforts at starting this wonderful group. I would
love to be a volunteer for this group and looki forward to assisting you in
whatever manner you deem fit. (I have hosted several e-groups earlier -- the
subject being technical writing.)

I look forward to contributing to the success of this group.

Greetings from India!

Guru
guru@...

I should have added that XMLSpy seems to perform functions similar to those
of ODBC2XML.XMLSpy can be optained through IBM's developer works.
Cheers
Paul Hoy


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Michael,

Thanks for your response. Soon after I emailed the note to the group I
discovered OpenJade and began experimenting with it immediately. I just have
to figure out out to make a .dsl file in order to perform the transform.

As for the ODBC2XML tool you mentioned I about to try it out right now.

Thanks for your help

I'll let the group know how things go.

Cheers
Paul Hoy


Here are a couple of possibilities:

   Oracle > XML: the ODBC2XML tool from XMLmethods.com:

     http://members.xoom.com/gvaughan/odbc2xml.htm

   XML > Frame: James Clark's Jade, a DSSSL engine

     http://www.jclark.com/jade/

Jade is a DSSSL implementation, not an XSL one, but it has a
backend that generates MIF, Frame's proprietary markup language.
(It has other backends for RTF and TeX).

The MIF files it generates can then be opened, edited, and printed
in Frame, and resaved as either MIF files or as normal Frame
binary files.


   -- Mike Smith

--
Michael Smith         ...  xml-doc-owner@egroups.com
Moderator
XML-DOC mailing list  ...  http://www.egroups.com/group/xml-doc/




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On Saturday, July 01, 2000, Paul Hoy wrote:

> Is it possible to use take Oracle tables, transform them to XML
> (using XSL), and then transform them, again, to Framemaker?
>
> I'm not expecting a comprehensive response, but some kind of
> direction in this matter would be great.

Here are a couple of possibilities:

   Oracle > XML: the ODBC2XML tool from XMLmethods.com:

     http://members.xoom.com/gvaughan/odbc2xml.htm

   XML > Frame: James Clark's Jade, a DSSSL engine

     http://www.jclark.com/jade/

Jade is a DSSSL implementation, not an XSL one, but it has a
backend that generates MIF, Frame's proprietary markup language.
(It has other backends for RTF and TeX).

The MIF files it generates can then be opened, edited, and printed
in Frame, and resaved as either MIF files or as normal Frame
binary files.


   -- Mike Smith

--
Michael Smith         ...  xml-doc-owner@egroups.com
Moderator
XML-DOC mailing list  ...  http://www.egroups.com/group/xml-doc/

Hi,

This new list is excellent timing for me. Thanks for starting it.

Is it possible to use take Oracle tables, transform them to XML (using XSL),
and then transform them, again, to Framemaker?

I'm not expecting a comprehensive response, but some kind of direction in
this matter would be great.

Thanks


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

On Friday, June 30, 2000, Sona Mehta wrote:

> Hi Folks,
> I don't know how many of you are out there yet, but I have been waiting
> for an opportunity like this and am therefore jumping to it. I don't
> know XML. Out here in the UK it has not caught up yet. I would like
> suggestions on which is the best way to start on XML. How many of you
> learnt it on your own and how many of you took a training?

One good place to start is the "Training and Tutorials" folder on
the XML-DOC links page:

   http://www.egroups.com/links/xml-doc/

My two cents: The little I know about XML I picked up from reading
materials on the Web, from a couple of good books, but mostly from
talking to knowledgeable people about it, asking them a lot of
questions, and getting them to point me in the right directions.

I do have a colleague who went through Architag's "XML 101" course
and found it very useful. I'm sure that there are many other
organizations offering good instructor-led training course in XML.

If I were to take such a course, however, I'd very much prefer to
take it from an organization that specializes in XML/SGML --
especially one that's already been doing SGML training for years.
There are a few such organizations around, and most do XML/SGML
consulting as well as training.

I would not personally recommend taking an instructor-led XML
course from (for example) an organization previously specializing
in Web/HTML applications -- and especially not from a "we teach
everything!" outfit that tries to offer it all: from courses in
office applications to courses in Java etc.

   -- Mike Smith


--
Michael Smith         ...  xml-doc-owner@egroups.com
Moderator
XML-DOC mailing list  ...  http://www.egroups.com/group/xml-doc/

On Friday, June 30, 2000, Garrett Winn wrote:

> We are trying to figure out if it is possible to take our XML
> source and create a WinHelp file (like an RTF or something
> similar).
>
> And if it is possible, then what is the best/easiest method of
> doing that?
>
> If it is not possible, then is there anyone else out there who
> may be looking to do the same thing?

If WinHelp is really what you want: though it's certainly possible
with XML/XSL and the right processing application, I don't know of
any XSL solutions.

However, there is at least one DSSSL-based solution: an SGML DTD +
DSSSL stylesheet + batch file package put together by an
SGML/DSSSL developer named Wayne Richards. You can download it at:

   http://www.oasis-open.org/cover/winHelpJade.zip

It also requires that you install Jade (James Clark's free DSSSL
engine), Perl, and a Help compiler. And you'll also need to author
your XML using his special "Helpfile" DTD, or -- if you have XML
that you've already authored in another DTD -- transform your XML
so that it validates against his Helpfile DTD.

If that all sounds like too much work, you might consider going to
HTMLHelp instead. The transformation is much less complicated,
and there's at least one existing commercial product that can do
it: Arbortext's DocBook Application for Epic Publisher. You can
find out more about it at:

  
http://www.arbortext.com/Products/Product_Options/DocBook_Application/body_docbo\
ok_application.html

You could also try contacting Jirka Kosek <jirka@...>, an
XML/XSL developer who only about a week ago posted to the
DOCBOOK-APPS mailing list his own (free) XSL stylesheet for
generating HTMLHelp from DocBook XML documents.

Of course, both of those solutions require that you author in or
transform to the DocBook DTD. But authoring in DocBook is
something you ought to strongly consider doing anyway, if you
haven't already. It will make you work easier in many, many ways.

If you end up trying any of these XML > Help generators -- or any
others -- I hope you can come back to the list and  post a summary
of your experiences with them.

    -- Mike Smith


--
Michael Smith         ...  xml-doc-owner@egroups.com
Moderator
XML-DOC mailing list  ...  http://www.egroups.com/group/xml-doc/

I want to use several entities in my XML document: em dash (—),
left quote (“), and right quote (”), for example.

Because these are not predefined entities included in the XML
specification, I have tried defining them im the DOCTYPE declaration.
But no luck. The problem seems to be that the contents of the entity
being defined can't start with an ampersand (&). Entity contents
work just fine when they are straight alpha text.

Does anyone know how I can make this work using entities?

Lynnea Clark

Hi!

We are trying to figure out if it is possible to take our XML source and
create a WinHelp file (like an RTF or something similar).

And if it is possible, then what is the best/easiest method of doing that?

If it is not possible, then is there anyone else out there who may be
looking to do the same thing?

Thanks,

Garrett Winn


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Hi,

I'll get the ball rolling with a question about the above, as this is
exactly what my team are proposing to do. I hope it is not too lame or vague
to elicit some useful responses:

Is it possible to do this with vanilla FrameMaker, or must we migrate to
FM+SGML?

Also, are there any tools available that will let us extract only certain
tagged information from FM+SGML documents to achieve single-sourcing. You
can't do this with Frame, correct?

Ian Saunders
Vodafone Lt.d

Hi Folks,
I don't know how many of you are out there yet, but I have been waiting
for an opportunity like this and am therefore jumping to it. I don't
know XML. Out here in the UK it has not caught up yet. I would like
suggestions on which is the best way to start on XML. How many of you
learnt it on your own and how many of you took a training?

The one who posted the first (dumb) question to the list

Sona

WordPerfect 9 has sometimes been recommended (in Usenet groups and
elsewhere) as an easy-to-use, cheap ($150) alternative to high-end
XML authoring applications. For one perspective on its XML
capabilities, read "XML in WordPerfect 9: A User's View" at:

    http://www.xml.com/pub/2000/05/31/wordperfect/index2.html

WebReview recently polled "Web designers and markup authors" on
the question: "Are you authoring with XML?" See the results at:

   http://www.webreview.com/wr/pub/2000/06/23/poll/results.html

XML in the News...

Included in this message is a recent news story titled,
"XML moves to the mainstream." The final section, "Today,
PostScript; tomorrow, XML" is especially interesting.


To access the original HTML version of the story, visit:

   http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/zd/20000626/tc/xml_moves_to_the_mainstream_1.html


------------------------------------------------------------------


XML moves to the mainstream

    By Andreas Pfeiffer, the Pfeiffer Report on Emerging Trends and
    Technologies, Special to ZDNet [Monday June 26 02:16 PM EDT]

.................................................................

    Already a vehicle for high-end content and asset management on
    the Web, the industrial-strength markup language is poised to
    break into shrink-wrapped applications.

What is happening with Extensible Markup Language?

    Over the past few years, the markup language derived from SGML
    (Standard Generic Markup Language) has gained a lot of ground
    in high-end information-management applications. Lately, XML
    has also become an industry buzzword, a must-have feature for
    anybody working in modern content-processing applications.

    While XML has been the backbone for high-end applications for
    some time, the market for shrink-wrapped XML products is also
    starting to take off.

    Quark Inc. just shipped avenue.quark, its XML import/export
    extension for QuarkXPress. Meanwhile, Adobe Systems Inc.
    (Nasdaq:ADBE - news) has released FrameMaker 6.0, which exports
    (but doesn't import) XML and has announced XML support for the
    next version of Golive, to name just a few examples.

    As for Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq:MSFT - news), the company's
    recently announced .Net strategy for Internet-based services is
    also based on XML.

Twenty questions

    Is there a low-end XML market? What strategies should software
    developers use to jump on the XML bandwagon? Will XML simply
    stay a data format, or is there an emerging market for XML
    applications?

    There's no quick and easy answer to these questions. XML is a
    very powerful tool, and it has proven over and over that as far
    as data interchange goes, it has a lot to offer.

    In recent years, XML has become the de facto standard for
    high-end content and asset management. Therefore, it's not
    surprising that more and more software developers are flocking
    to support it.

    We are currently going through a trend of media consolidation,
    both on the corporate level and as far as end users are
    concerned. High-end applications are increasingly required to
    support XML. But where is the low end of the market going?

    And for developers, is there room for an XML killer app?

Quark's XML avenue

    Quark is giving the market a shot with avenue.quark, which will
    also be part of XPress 5.0. avenue.quark is an extension for
    XML import and export that angles for high-end integration of
    XPress-based content with XML-based Web-authoring systems such
    Vignette Story Server.

    It is also a showcase application to demonstrate that Quark is
    moving full steam into cross-media publishing. It will be
    interesting to observe whether avenue.quark will build a user
    base outside its captive audience, namely high-end Web content
    managers who need to integrate XPress-based content with their
    data-serving applications on the Web.

    For the main publishing market to move seriously to XML-based
    data structures, it will be necessary to re-engineer the
    applications and proprietary data structures extensively. This
    won't happen overnight. For example, while avenue.quark will
    outfit XPress 5 with XML import and export, there's little to
    indicate that the XPress file format will be rewritten to move
    closer to XML-based structures.

    As for Adobe, the company's official position on XML is not
    very clear yet either, despite its moves to embrace established
    standards.

Who needs it?

    For software developers, it is important to assess how much XML
    support and development will be needed in order to stay ahead
    of the market. And that in turn will depend on whether XML data
    structures can move beyond the realm in which they have
    acquired standard status.

    Does the end user need XML? More importantly, does the end user
    think he needs XML? Market perception can be as important as
    genuine need for a an emerging technology.

    Interestingly, XML reverses the common pattern of technology
    adoption that has driven much of the high-tech market.
    Practically all tools that have gained predominant market
    position have evolved from the ground up, starting their
    careers as end-user applications and then becoming increasingly
    professional. If XML moves beyond vertical, high-end
    applications, its progress will represent the inverse of that
    standard operating procedure.

    In the end, whether or not the markup language becomes
    pervasive beyond the high end of content management will also
    depend on software developers.

Today, PostScript; tomorrow, XML

    Right now, there is a consensus that XML is complex and needs
    specially trained operators. Nevertheless, PostScript drawing
    packages and other applications have demonstrated that it is
    indeed possible to make complex, programming-based processes
    reasonably simple to use.

    XML is today where PostScript was before the arrival of Adobe
    Illustrator: a programming language that could be manipulated
    through a number of specialized utilities -- but did not really
    have much end-user functionality.

    For XML to become as much a standard as Adobe's
    page-description language will require strong development
    efforts as well as broad end-user interest and education, which
    only happens when products move into the highly competitive
    realm of shrink-wrapped software.

    The market is not there yet, but XML is not going away. We are
    living in a world where non proprietary data-structures have
    become essential to an increasing number of users. What really
    remains to be seen is which of the industry players will be
    capable of capturing and focusing this growing market interest
    with an XML killer app.

.................................................................

    Andreas Pfeiffer is an industry analyst and editor in chief of
    the Pfeiffer Report on Emerging Trends and Technologies.