Print Publishing/Desktop Publishing – Page 2

January 28, 2010

Adobe FrameMaker: Setting Tabs, Part III

by Barbara Binder

If you've been paying attention to my FrameMaker articles over the past few weeks, you've learned how to set tab stops and how to modify them. Let's finish up this series by learning how to work with dot leaders.

Dot Leaders in a Table of Contents

The typical table of contents will display leader dots between the entry and the page number. Should you press the period key repeatedly to add these dots? Nooooo! Try this, instead.

Open a new, portrait document.
Select the Right-align tab from the Paragraph Formatting toolbar (the Right-align tab is the red item shown below).
Click under the ruler to set a right-align tab stop under the 2 inch mark.
Type the following:
Select all of the lines and create a Paragraph format called "TOC leaders."
Double-click the tab arrow to open the Edit Tab Stop dialog box. Confirm that you have alignment set to right in the left column, and pick one of the leader options from the right column. (I prefer the ones that are a little more spread apart.)
Click Edit and then Update All (in the Paragraph Designer). Remove Overrides.

Nice, and if you need to adjust the position of the page numbers, just drag the tab arrow left or right. The leader will adjust accordingly.
Finish up with Update All, remove Overrides.

Dot Leaders in a Form

This same exercise can be used for forms that require lines. The only difference is that we use a line leader instead of a dot leader:

Open a new, portrait document.
Select the Right-align tab from the Paragraph Formatting toolbar.
Click under the ruler to set a right-align tab stop under the 3 inch mark.
Type in the following:
Select all of the lines and create a Paragraph format called "Form."
Double-click the tab arrow to open the Edit Tab Stop dialog box.
Confirm that you have alignment set to right in the left column, and type an underline (Shift+hyphen) into the Custom leader text box.
Click Edit and then Update All. Remove overrides.

That was extremely simple, and best of all, you can drag the tab arrow left or right to adjust the length of the lines.

***

If you are new to FrameMaker and want to get up to speed quickly, join IconLogic's instructor-led, online Introduction to Adobe FrameMaker 9 class. Too elementary for your skill level? How about the Advanced FrameMaker 9 class? Hope to "see" you there.

***

About the author: Barbara Binder is the president and founder of Rocky Mountain Training. Barbara has been a trainer for nearly two decades and has been recognized by Adobe as one of the top trainers world-wide.

January 22, 2010

Adobe FrameMaker: Setting Tabs, Part II

by Barbara Binder

Last week we talked about setting tab stops. To review the key points: 1.) press the tab key once between columns, 2.) add one tab stop per tab on each line of the table, and 3.) click under the ruler to add the tab stop.

In this column, I'd like to address how to modify the alignment and position of tabs.

Let's begin by either opening up the table from last week, or creating a new one that looks like this:

Create a Table That Looks Like This

Place your cursor on the first line of text.
To move the columns, drag the little tab arrows under the ruler to the left or the right.
Let's push each of the tab arrows a bit to the right or left.
Hmmm. How come only the first line is responding? Because that's where the cursor is. Click Update All in the Paragraph Designer to update the table.

To change the tab alignments, all you need to do is double-click the little arrows, which will open the Edit Tab Stop dialog box. You can pick the new tab alignment from the list at the left.

Double-click the first tab arrow, change the alignment to center and click Edit.
Double-click the second tab arrow, change the alignment to decimal and click Edit.
Double-click the third tab arrow, change the alignment to right and click Edit.
Click Update All in the Paragraph Designer to update all of the lines.

Once you change alignment, you will likely have to adjust the tab positions again. Drag each tab left or right, and when you are satisfied, click Update All.

If you end up with extra tabs on the line, you can delete a tab by dragging it up or down, out of the ruler.

If you remember these rules, you should be good to go:

Click (under the ruler) to add a tab stop.
Double-click the tab arrow to edit the tab alignment.
Drag the tab arrow left or right to adjust the column position.
Drag the tab arrow up or down to remove a tab arrow from the ruler.

My students will often question my use of tabs in setting up a table like the one above. Why not use the table feature, they ask. I agree, why not? Controlling the presentation is more flexible using a table, but I believe that this exercise helps you to understand how tabs work in general. When you try to format a table of contents or set up form rules, this foundation is critical.

Tune in next week for tips on setting up leader dots.

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January 14, 2010

Adobe FrameMaker: Setting Tabs, Part 1

by Barbara Binder

Why are people afraid of setting tabs? Since 1988, I've taught Word, PageMaker, Ventura Publisher, InDesign and FrameMaker classes, and most of my students walk in the door afraid of tabs. It's one of life's mysteries, and so I always try to set aside some time to address it in class. Here's your motivation to keep reading: once you master tabs in one program, you use the same logic in all the others.

The first trick to mastering tabs is to stop relying on the default tabs every half inch. FrameMaker makes that easy, by not offering you default tabs for the Body format. The second trick is to add just one tab between columns (not 2 tabs, or tab space tab, or any other combination). Let's give it a shot:

Create a new, portrait FrameMaker document.
Make sure that your text symbols are showing by looking for a checkmark in front of View > Text Symbols. If not, click on Text Symbols to activate the command.
Type Pierre on the first line, and press the tab key once.
Hey! The cursor didn't go anywhere. That would be because there are no default tabs in the Body format.
Click your mouse just under the 2.5 inch mark on the vertical ruler. That little arrow that just appeared? That's your first tab. Notice how your cursor jumped to that position.
Type Thursday and press the tab key again.
Again, no cursor movement, so go ahead and click under both the 4 and the 5 inch marks.
Type in 9.5, press the tab key once, and type France.
Press Enter and complete the table as shown below:
When you finish typing, click the Update All button in the Paragraph Designer to update the Body format, and Remove Overrides. (In a real project, I'd make a new format for the table, but we are just trying to figure this out, so we'll use Body here.)

That wasn't so bad was, it? But, all of the columns are left-aligned. I'd like to change their alignments to match this:

Tabs you will learn to create new week

Tune in next week for modifying tabs.

***

December 23, 2009

Adobe FrameMaker: Page Navigation

by Barbara Binder

Sure you know how to get from one page to another in a FrameMaker document, but are you a Page Navigation Expert? If not, you certainly should be. As I've said many times, shaving seconds off your work here and there can quickly add up to minutes or even hours of production time in a FrameMaker project.

Besides the vertical scroll bars and the scroll wheel on the mouse, see how many of these you know (and use):

FrameMaker page navigation

In a long document, I'm going to guess that you rely fairly heavily on the Go to Page dialog box, but have you tried out the two new navigation features in FrameMaker 9?

Go To Page dialog

Go to Page Containing the Insertion Point is great when you scroll away from the page where you were working, and want to get back but have forgotten where you were. And jumping to a specific Line Number is nice when you are trying to guide another FrameMaker user to a specific spot in the document, to enter a correction for example. If you find those commands useful, note that you can also access them from the status bar in the lower right hand corner of your screen:

Go to Line Number is on the left, and the button on the right will take you to the page containing the insertion point.

Finally, a discussion on page navigation wouldn't be complete without mentioning that you can follow any hyperlink in an unlocked FrameMaker document by simply holding down Control and Alt keys as you click on the link.

Now you really are a FrameMaker Page Navigation Expert. Feel free to put it on your résumé!

***

December 16, 2009

Adobe FrameMaker: Aligning Punctuation in Numbered Lists

by Barbara Binder

When I teach Numbering Properties to new FrameMaker users, about half of them ask me how to line up the punctuation on a numbered list. The picture on the left shows what I am supposed to teach them, the picture on the right show what they actually want.

Example of Punctuation in Numbered Lists

How do you do it? The trick is setting two tab stops per list item: one decimal tab for the punctuation, and one left align tab for the text. Here you go:

Create a Paragraph Format for your list. I used List2 in my example.
Open up Numbering Properties and add the following to the Autonumber Format line: \t<n+>.\t
Click Update All.
Open up Basic Properties and set the Left Indent value. I used 30 pts.
Still in Basic Properties, add two tab stops.
The first tab stop should be a Decimal tab. (I used 20 pts in my example.)

The second tab stop should be a Left aligned tab. Be sure that the number matches your left Indent value (again, I used 30 for my left indent, so I'm using 30 here).
Update all and voila!

***

December 10, 2009

Adobe FrameMaker: Dictionary-Style Running Heads

by Barbara Binder

If you are creating reference materials like a dictionary, glossary or telephone directory, you may be called on to produce "live" running heads, but with a twist. FrameMaker's Running H/F 1 variables are all set to go gather paragraphs from a document and display them in a running head, but the assumption is that you want the first paragraph from the page.

For example, if page two has three Heading1s, and you set your variable to <$paratext[Heading1]>, FrameMaker will pull the first Heading1 off the page, and will ignore the other two. In reference materials, that will work great for the left page header, but you may find it helpful to pull the last Heading1 off of the right hand pages, to show the range of information that appears on the facing pages spread. Here's how:

Set the Running H/F 1 variable on the left page to <$paratext[Heading1]>.
Set the Running H/F 2 variable on the right page to <$paratext[+,Heading1]>.

That's it! The plus sign (+) tells FrameMaker to find the last paragraph on the page matching the tag rather than the first paragraph.

***

by Barbara Binder

Set the Running H/F 1 variable on the left page to <$paratext[Heading1]>.
Set the Running H/F 2 variable on the right page to <$paratext[+,Heading1]>.

That's it! The plus sign (+) tells FrameMaker to find the last paragraph on the page matching the tag rather than the first paragraph.

***

December 1, 2009

Adobe FrameMaker: Even Smarter Running Heads

by Barbara Binder

We talked last week about creating smart running heads (using variables for "live" running heads that pull data off the page). These are great for your readers because they can tell at a glance what chapter and/or section they are in.

But what if you need to pull different paragraph formats into the running heads in different documents (for example, you want your contents title in your table of contents, your chapter titles in the main body of the book, and the index title in the index)? You could set up different master pages in each document, but then if you need to make a global change to, let's say the margins, when you import your Page Layout formats, you'll wipe out the customization. I have a much better way for you:

Choose View > Master Pages.
Click in a background frame to set up a header or footer.
Choose Format > Headers & Footers > Insert Other.
Scroll down to the Running H/F variables and select Running H/F 1 (assuming you aren't using it elsewhere. If you are and don't want to mess it up, just pick the next available Running H/F variable–you have a total of 12, and I'm pretty sure you aren't using all of them.)
Examine the default definition: <$paratext[Title]>.
In English, this says: "go get the paragraph text of the paragraph format called Title and put it in the running head."
Click the Edit button on the Variables pod (button number 3):
Edit the variable definition to call out each of the formats you'd like to see in your running head:
<$paratext[ContentsTitle,ChapterTitle,IndexTitle]>

In English, the variable now says: "If you can find a ContentsTitle, go get it and put it in the running head, but if you can't find it, see if you can find ChapterTitle and put that in the running head. If you can't find either, see if you can find IndexTitle and put that in the running head."

Wow! Now you can have one variable that works for the front matter, the body of the book, and the back matter. That's a smart variable!

***

If you are new to FrameMaker and want to get up to speed quickly, join IconLogic's instructor-led, online Introduction to Adobe FrameMaker 9 class on December 2-3. Too elementary for your skill level? How about the Advanced FrameMaker 9 class on December 9-10? Hope to "see" you there (or at one of our future classes).

***

November 25, 2009

Adobe FrameMaker: Smart Running Heads

by Barbara Binder

One of the FrameMaker features I rely on heavily for my technical documents is the use of "live" headers and footers. Once I get them set up, they will automatically pull text off of my page into the running heads so that the reader can quickly see what chapter they are in, or what section, or both.

I accomplish this through the use of System Variables. There are lots of variables in FrameMaker, but the ones I'm talking about here are the Running H/F variables. To use them you need to begin by identifying the text in the document that you would like to appear in your running heads. The usual suspects would be the chapter title and perhaps also the section titles. Once you identify the text, you need to jot down the exact spelling of the paragraph formats that are assigned to them. If you are using the default paragraph format names, these might be "Title" and "Heading1". The names themselves don't matter, but matching the spelling and capitalization does, so you need to know exactly what the format names are, before proceeding. Ready? Here we go:

Choose View > Master Pages.
Click in one of the header or footer background frames.
Choose Format > Headers & Footers > Insert Other.
Scroll down through the list of variables until you find Running H/F 1. Click on it once to select it.
Evaluate the Definition to see if it will work for you as is. The default definition reads: <$paratext[Title]>.
In English, this says "go get the paragraph text of the paragraph format called Title and put it at the cursor position." As long as you are using the default chapter title name Title, that will work. But what if you opted to call all of your titles ChapterTitle? Then you better update the definition to read <$paratext[ChapterTitle]>. Remember, if the format names don't match exactly, they won't work.
If you need to update the definition, click the little gear button on the Pod toolbar (button number 3).
Edit the Definition to match your spelling of the title format, and then click Edit.
To insert the variable into the background frame, click the Insert button on the Pod toolbar (button number 1).
Repeat for the facing page, if you'd like, and then return to the Body pages.

Here's the best part. Once the Running H/F variables have been set up, changing the paragraph text on the page automatically updates the running heads. It's magical!

***

If you are new to FrameMaker and need some training, join our instructor-led, online Introduction to Adobe FrameMaker 9 class on December 2-3. Too elementary for your skill level? How about the Advanced FrameMaker 9 class on December 9-10? Hope to "see" you there.

***

November 19, 2009

Adobe FrameMaker: Automatically Assigning Custom Master Pages

by Barbara Binder

We talked last week about custom master pages. I use them in my FrameMaker documents to suppress page numbers on the opening page of a chapter or anytime I need a layout that differs from those of the default left and right master pages.

Once you have set up your master pages, you can assign them manually by choosing Format > Page Layout > Master Page Usage. That's great, but is there a better way to apply a master page to a document page? Absolutely.

In one of my publications, each new chapter starts on the next blank page (and not on the next right page, like so many others). I use a custom master to set the opening look for each chapter, but I need one for right page opening pages, and one for the left page open pages. Years and years ago, I had to do this manually, and inevitably missed a few during last minute edits.

What's a developer to do? How about setting up a Reference Page table to do the work for you? By setting up the MasterPageMap table, you can assign master pages to body pages that contain specified paragraph tags. I learned pretty quickly that if I delegated the master page assignments to FrameMaker, I'd never again make the mistake of not applying a master page.

Here's how you can automatically assign a custom master page to a document page:

Create a custom Master page. I created two called FirstRight and FirstLeft. (If you aren't sure how to create a custom Master page, feel free to click here and read last week's column.)
Navigate to Body Page 1 and click on your chapter title format.
Jot down the exact spelling of the format. If you use the default FrameMaker paragraph formats, this will probably be called "Title."
Choose View > Reference Pages.
Click the Next Page button until the five-column UnstructMasterPageMaps table appears. If you don't see the table below, move on to step 6. If you find the table below, skip to step 7.
If the mapping table does not appear in the reference pages, choose Format > Page Layout > Apply Master Pages.

Click OK to proceed and then click OK to create the new table on the reference pages.
For Book Update (Yes or No), type Yes or No to determine whether the specified master page will be applied when you choose Apply Master Pages from a book.
Under the Paragraph Tag Name column heading, type the name of the paragraph tag to which you want the master page to be applied.
In my example, I am using Title. You must spell the paragraph tag name correctly, using the same capitalization that the paragraph tag uses.
In the second column, type in the custom Master page for all right pages that have a Title tag.
In my example, I'm applying FirstRight.

If necessary, do the same thing for the left pages, but use the left opening page.
Under the Range Indicator column heading, type Single to apply the master page only to the Body page on which each paragraph tag appears. (Type Span pages to apply the master page to the entire span of pages to which the paragraph tag is applied; or type Until changed to apply the master page to all pages, until the next Body page with a different paragraph tag listed in the mapping table is encountered.)
Optionally, add notes to the Comments column.
Text you type in this column does not affect how master pages are applied in any way.
When you are done, choose View > Body Pages.

Ready for the magic?

Open your Book window.
Import the mapping table to the other files in your book.
Update your book. (Be sure to select Apply Master Pages before you click update.)

***

If you are new to FrameMaker and need some training, I've got an instructor-led, online Introduction to Adobe FrameMaker 9 class on December 2-3. Too elementary for your skill level? How about the Advanced FrameMaker 9 class on December 9-10? Hope to "see" you there.

***

About the author: Barbara Binder is the president and founder of Rocky Mountain Training. Barbara has been a trainer for nearly two decades and was recently recognized by Adobe as one of the top trainers world-wide for 2007.

November 11, 2009

Adobe FrameMaker: Custom Master Pages

by Barbara Binder

New FrameMaker documents have default Master Pages. Single-sided documents have one, called "Right," and double-sided documents have two, called "Left" and "Right."

We use these pages to place the objects we want to repeat on all the Body Pages, things like our running heads, page numbers and repeating graphics.

But what do you do when you need a different look for a Body Page, on a repeating basis? For example, no page number on the opening page of each chapter? You set up a custom master page. Here's how:

Choose View > Master Pages.
Choose Special > Add Master Page.
Select which master you'd like to base the new one on, and give it a logical name.
Make any changes that you like to the new master (i.e., remove the page number for the opening page), and return to Body page 1 by choosing View > Body Pages.
Did that work? No! FrameMaker is very powerful, but still can't read your mind. If you are going to create custom master pages, you will also have the obligation to apply them to the Body pages. Here's the easiest way:
Choose Format > Page Layout > Master Page Usage.
Select your custom master from the drop down list at the top, and the page range from the bottom, and click Apply.

There you go. You are allowed 100 master pages in a single FrameMaker document, so you can make as many as necessary. I usually create one for the opening page of my chapters, one for the "This page intentionally left blank." pages, and one each for left and right Landscape pages in my portrait documents.

Tune in next week for automating the custom master page application!

***

If you are new to FrameMaker and need some training, I've got an instructor-led, online Introduction to Adobe FrameMaker 9 class coming up December 2-3, 2009. Looking for advanced FrameMaker training? Click here to see our upcoming Adobe FrameMaker 9 Advanced dates. Looking for other online classes? Click here.

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