XML and FrameMaker

The book; xml & framemaker, is comprehensive, but does not answer all of my questions. Cutting through the book by itself without the presence of a tutor has been a bit frustrating. The explanation about DTD's and application files are not as clear and as complete as I would have liked them to be. The reasons for, the why's and wherefore's are not fully discussed in my opinion. A broader and more comprehensive approach needs to be taken here. Exercises need to be included, maybe a companion workbook to more broadly guide the student in the ways of framemaker methodology and xml. XML & FrameMaker to me has some small gaps to fill here. It is not quite the seemless course manual I would have expected. I am easily confused and mislead by some of the terminology used here. There are whole pages where I don't even know what I'm reading about. I lose the thrust of what is being discussed in a thick stew of gobbled-gook. There should also be a companion CD that comes with the book. That way, it will assure that all electronic files can be accessed instead of having to download off the internet-where a file search can become an exhausting affair. You end up having to search through a multi-page smorgasboard just to find what you're looking for. I think this was more geared for the regular framemaker user who wants to move over to the structured side. The author knows her subject very well, but she needs to think more in terms of the person who does not know where he's at in the darkness of the subject matter.

No doubt about it, this is a very good book for learning about FrameMaker's interaction with XML. I agree with the other reviewers: this is way better than the info supplied by Adobe in both the FM manual and in the supplementary PDF's that come with FrameMaker. One caveat: the example files available for download from Apress's Web site (the publisher) don't match the narrative in the book. This may be a great disappointment to you as it was to me. Reading along and looking at the pictures in the book was not the same as exploring live examples -- and possibly using them as the basis for my own XML. Still, there were illustrations provided in the book, and with some imagination, there was information to be gained.

This is an excelent reference and training book which is applicable to all users, from new user to experienced user.

This review relates only to the Kindle version.All of the book's content is included. But the publisher did a poor job of converting the text for the Kindle format. The images scale weird. And the side-bar content is randomly inserted in bizarre locations (they don't align with the print book nor do they align with the content for which they support).This poor treatment (by the publisher) seems unacceptable to me. Especially when you consider that the price for the Kindle version is nearly identical to the print book.--Using a Kindle 3G Wireless with the 6" Display (3rd generation)

Recently I had to use FrameMaker as authoring tool for DoocBook, it was quite a challenging task because it required learning a lot of new stuff. FrameMaker is a powerful and sophisticated tool, with XML capabilities that were build on top of its SGML legacy, so it's a pretty complex beast to learn. This book was just right on the spot; it allowed me to save an outrageous amount of time and frustration. I don't know if it can be valuable for seasoned FrameMaker users, but I am sure it's a great investment if you have to deal with FrameMaker and XML starting from scratch

I had been trying to get my hands around Structured FrameMaker for quite some time when I purchased this manual. I am about two-thirds finished with it and I am now successfully creating XML files from FrameMaker.This manual fills in many holes that I couldn't figure out from the Adobe supplied resources. This manual also has a great tutorial for creating templates that many people may find useful if they are new to template building.

Ce livre est decevant et mal construit. Trop d'exemples differents ont ete utilises, ce qui perd le lecteur. Les exemples numeriques telechargeables sur le site d'apress ne correspondent pas toujours a ce qui est decrit dans le livre. La relecture a ete mal faite; certaines images ne sont visiblement pas a leur place. Malheureusement a defaut de meilleur livre a ce sujet, je ne peux que le conseiller si vous demarrez dans Framemaker et XML.