This is the mail archive of the docbook-apps@lists.oasis-open.org mailing list .


Index Nav: [Date Index] [Subject Index] [Author Index] [Thread Index]
Message Nav: [Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next]
Other format: [Raw text]

Re: [docbook-apps] RE: HTML -> DocBook Conversion?


Here's what I've tried - all with no success..  :-(

Attempt 1:
Export Frame 6 document to Html
use tidy to make html doc xhtml doc
use html2db tool on xhtml doc to produce docbook
** tons of validation errors - invalide docbook **

Attempt 2:
Export Frame 6 document to xml
use "fm2doc.xsl" stylesheet (found off the web) to attempt to produce
docbook:
     xsltproc -v -o JSF-db.xml fm2doc.xsl JSF.xml
** xslt processing stuck in infinite loop **

At this point, I am not very hopeful of getting the conversion to work
with any automated process.  I'm not an xslt guru.
Looks like this is going to be a *very* painful (and manual) process
(sigh)....

-roger


Michael Smith wrote:
Steve Whitlatch <swhitlat@getnet.net> writes:

  
Hello Roger,

Is the FrameMaker document already in structured form in
FrameMaker? If not, then this information may not help. I
have webbed a detailed rerecord of my experience with
DocBook+FrameMaker at:

http://www.getnet.net/~swhitlat

Follow the DocBook link on the left.
    

Do you have a summary written up about any problems or limitations
you ran into getting valid DocBook output from Frame 7? A couple
years back Bob Stayton wrote up a list of some problems he found,
and I did the same. Summary is at:

  http://groups.yahoo.com/group/xml-doc/message/3257

Did you run into those same problems? If so, how did you work
around them? Post-processing, maybe? Or some custom proramming.

[...]

  
For a single document, I would probably do the work
manually. However, there could be a solution going to MIF
and then sending the MIF file through some type of
tag-mapping process via Perl or another text manipulation
tool. To learn how to do that would probably take some
people (me) much, much longer than the manual process.

So, for a single document, it's just work. For hundreds or
thousands of documents, a MIF expert who knows the text
conversion tools would be the solution. Some consultants who
fit that category often participate on the various
FrameMaker mailing lists.
    

One thing about working with MIF is, there is no free open-source
MIF parser for Frame 5 (or 6 or 7). There was one once that could
handle Frame 4 files, I think. So if you were really to build your
own system for working with MIF in Perl or whatever, you'd first
need to create a MIF parser.

If (and this is a big If, I know) you don't need to preserve the
content of your Frame markers (index markers, hypertext links,
etc.) on conversion to DocBook, I think going from Frame's "plain"
XML output through a custom XSLT stylesheet to generate DocBook
works pretty well.

And one big advantage of it is you don't need to learn any
proprietary application-specific language/system (e.g., Frame 7's
stuff or WebWorks Publisher's macro language).  All you need to
learn is some basic XSLT, and of course learning that will end up
being useful for a lot more than just converting Frame content.

(And Steve, I don't mean you personally, because I know you
already know XSLT -- I'm just using "you" in the general sense).

  --Mike
  


Index Nav: [Date Index] [Subject Index] [Author Index] [Thread Index]
Message Nav: [Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next]