Disappearing formatting in TOC, LOT, and LOF

[kmyers]

Whenever I rename book files to a specific document number from a FrameMaker template, the formatting for the generated files disappears. It's like the page layout of the master pages disappears and they revert to master page layout of "None".

The formatting is all there in the template until the renaming occurs.

Is there some esoteric FrameMaker trick that could cause/prevent this?

We're using a number of templates and the disappearing formatting is costing valuable editing time. I'd really appreciate any help that anyone has to offer.

 

[Rhea113]

Yes, there is a&quot; secret.&quot; It shouldn't be a secret, of course, but this particular piece of functionality is just not one of Adobe's finest hours. <G> Here's how it works:

The generated files in a book must have the same name as the book--plus the correct additional letters--and must be in the same directory as the book. For example, suppose your book is named UserGuide.fm and you want a TOC, List of Tables, and index. Further, you have templates for all of these generated files.

1. For the TOC, take the template and put it in the directory with the book. Name it UserGuideTOC.fm. Similarly, take the List if Tables template and the Index template, copy them to the book directory and name them UserGuideLOT.fm and UserGuideIX.fm.

2. Open the book file and choose Add->Table of Contents (or Standard Index, or List of whatever). Frame displays a Set Up dialog in which you choose which paragraph tags or marker types to include in the generated file. But notice the Suffix field at the top of the dialog. The letters in that suffix field MUST match the added letters in the file name. For example, if your table of contents says TOC in the Suffix field, then your file must be named UserGuideTOC.fm. If you wanted to name the file UserGuideTC.fm, you could do that, but you'd have to make sure that the Suffix field in the Set Up dialog said TC also. By extension, if your List of Tables is named UserGuideLOT.fm, then the Suffix in the Set Up dialog must be LOT. And so on.

3. Now the generated files will pick up the formatting in the templates IF AND ONLY IF you didn't change the paragraph tag names. But suppose your TOC template was set to pick up a paragraph tag called Heading 1 and you renamed the tag to 1H-Heading1 (to make it easy to apply from the keyboard). To make the TOC template work properly, open UserGuideTOC.fm and display the Heading 1TOC tag in the Paragraph Designer. Change its name to 1H-Heading1TOC. Do the same for any other tags you renamed. NOW the template will work!

Maybe someday Adobe will come up with a more intuitive way to do this. In the meantime, once you master this you get the gratifying feeling that you are a wizard with power over mysterious forces.