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[previous article] [next article]George A. Bailey
FrameMaker is a revolutionary writing tool capable of being used as a word processor, graphics editor, page designer, and book builder. Although FrameMaker is an extremely powerful program it is relatively easy to use. The recent acquisition of a campus-wide Frame license/purchase agreement has made FrameMaker available on all ECN Sun Solaris and HP workstations.
The agreement provides FrameMaker for Mac and Windows machines at a cost of approximately $200 per station. It is hoped that students will be able to purchase FrameMaker for home machines in the near future at similar or lower costs. FrameMaker is not widely available on University Mac and Windows machines currently.
This article is going to demonstrate how to create a new document, edit an existing document, and how to manipulate some special features.
The templates are located in directories that relate to their purpose. Templates for creating a book are located in the Book/ directory, business in the Business/ directory and so forth. To access a template; double click on the related directory name, (the listing appears in the center of the New dialog box) and review the list provided. Click on the template name and then click on Create button. This will open the new document using the template settings.
A template won't always be the most convenient route to take so starting with a fresh palette will be more common. Starting with a blank piece of paper is just as simple. You have one of three choices: do you want a portrait layout, a landscape layout or a custom layout? Layout refers to how the page is formatted.
To open the document in one step, double click the document name in the scroll list. If the file you want to open is not in the scroll list, change to another directory by double clicking a directory name in the scroll list or by typing a different directory name in the text box above the scroll list and clicking Open. This could take a few seconds so don't panic when it doesn't happen immediately.
If you open any file other than a FrameMaker file, FrameMaker tries to convert it to a FrameMaker document. Files that FrameMaker will convert for you are: Microsoft Word, WordPerfect, Interleaf, troff and ASCII formats. FrameMaker requires that you the user know the application format and version.
FrameMaker also provides keyboard shortcuts for almost every menu command. To use a keyboard shortcut press the ESC key and the two letter combination next to the command on the menu bar. For example if you wanted to bold a line of text, press ESC-cb. Keyboard shortcuts are case-sensitive, be sure to type lowercase and uppercase letters just as they appear on the menus.
Another handy tool that FrameMaker provides is called the Maker menu. To choose a command from the Maker menu, point your mouse to anywhere on the page, press down the right mouse button, move the pointer to highlight your choice and release the mouse button. Or click the right mouse button in the document window and then click the command on the menu.
FrameMaker permits the user to save in different formats. To save in a different format, choose Save As from the File menu. From the "Save As" dialog box click on Format, this will cause a sub-menu to appear. From this sub-menu, choose the format to save in your file in and click on Save.
The first option that you can change is the Print Page Range. This option tells FrameMaker how much of the document you want to print, by default it is set to All. To change the range click on Start Page and enter the page numbers to be printed in the two boxes provided. Next you can change the number of copies to be printed by changing the number in the "Copies" text box. Make sure the printer name listed in the "Printer Name" box is the one you want.
After changing the settings (assuming you wanted to) click on Print in the lower left corner of the dialog box. Printing can take several minutes depending on the printer and the number of people printing, so don't panic when it doesn't happen immediately.
If altered files haven't been saved, FrameMaker will ask whether you want to save the changes or cancel closing the document.
To exit FrameMaker, click Exit in the main FrameMaker window. This is the window that appears when you start FrameMaker, it consists of New, Open, Help, Info, and Exit.
This article has concentrated on the basic procedures to get you started and working in the FrameMaker environment. Although you don't need to know anything else to produce excellent looking documents, FrameMaker has some built-in features to help. Features like a spell checker, a thesaurus, and the ability to insert tables and graphics.
To check for spelling errors, choose Spelling Checker from the Edit menu. The "Spelling Checking" dialog box will now appear. At this point you can spell check the document using the default settings by clicking on Start Checking located in the far left corner of the dialog box; or you can tell FrameMaker what to look for when searching for errors. To do this click on Options, located on the right side of the dialog box. Clicking on Options causes the "Spelling Checker Options" dialog box to appear. This is where you tell FrameMaker what to look for, by clicking the boxes next to each category it. This will either turn that search on or off. The box will be shaded when that search is enabled.
If FrameMaker finds an error it will halt the search and display a list of suggested words. At this point you have a few choices of how to correct the misspelling.
To cancel spell checking, point in the Spelling Checker or document window, and press Control-c.
To look up a word in the document, select the word by highlighting it with your mouse pointer then, choose Thesaurus from the Edit menu. Information about the selected word will appear in the "Thesaurus" dialog box. To look up a word that is not already in the document, choose Thesaurus from the Edit menu (be sure that no text is highlighted at this time). Type the word in the "Thesaurus Look Up" dialog box and click Look Up. When you click Look Up, information on the word will appear in the "Thesaurus" dialog box. When the right word has been found, click on Replace. The new word is now in your document.
To insert a table into your document, click in the line of text to which you want to anchor the table. Next choose Insert Table from the Table menu. The "Insert Table" dialog box will now appear. A couple of steps must be taken to customize your table.
To import a graphic file into a FrameMaker document, you first must indicate where you want the graphic to be place. Do this by placing your cursor in the location where the graphic will be. Then choose Anchored Frame from the Special menu. This will cause the "Anchored Frame" dialog box to appear. There are many items to adjust at this point, like position, alignment, size, and the type of frame. Starting with the Frame there are two choices, you can either choose a Cropped frame which will cause the text to flow around it while editing; or you can choose a Floating frame which will be pushed down as editing occurs.
The next step is to decide on the Anchored Position. Choices include: Below Current Line, Above Current Line, etc. Along with the Position, you must decide on the Alignment. Alignments include Left, Right, Center. The last step is to decide how large to make the frame. Once all the settings in the "Anchored Frame" dialog box have been configured click on New Frame.
The frame you constructed should now appear in your document. To place a graphic image within that frame, choose Import from the File menu. When the sub-menu appears, choose File. The "Import File" dialog box will now appear on your screen. Click on the graphic file you want to import and the import method (meaning either import by Reference or Copy into document).
This is one of the features that doesn't have the ability to Undo itself so be sure to select the right file. After selecting the file and method, click on Import. If by chance you selected a Bitmap file to import, a "Scaling" dialog box will appear. The purpose of this dialog box is to tell FrameMaker how large to scale the image. Click on one of the DPI settings (dots per inch) and click on Set.
Remember the larger the dpi setting, the smaller the image will be. Although FrameMaker can't undo this procedure, if you would like to remove the image from your document the easiest way I found was to highlight it with your mouse pointer and choose Cut from the Edit menu.
The help Main Menu will appear with a table of contents. Choose a topic from the table of contents and a more detailed menu will appear. Choose a topic from this more detailed list and receive your help.
As you use FrameMaker, you will realize how useful this program is. There are many other features and commands that FrameMaker provides that I couldn't describe in this article.
Feel free to e-mail me if you have questions on the usage of FrameMaker at baileyga@ecn.purdue.edu.
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