Re: PDF File Into Framemaker 6.0

[larry.kollar@xxxxxxxxxx]

Rick Melanson wrote:

> I thought that I had pre existing Framemaker files for a book I need to
> update, BUT no, all I have are HTML files and PDF files. Can I get the 
PDF
> files back into Framemaker files with editable text.

I just had to deal with this yesterday. If you have a good template,
you'll save yourself a big pile of time using this technique:

  1) Print out the PDF. You'll need this for reference.

  2) Get GhostScript from  http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/  and use
     the ps2ascii utility to dump the text out of the PDF. Use a
     text editor (or Frame, it doesn't matter) to remove the table
     of contents and recurring headers & footers. Another possibility
     is to use access.adobe.com, but you may not want to do that if
     the info is sensitive since it's going across the net.

  3) Copy the text into a Frame template, or open the text file in
     Frame & import all formats from the template into the file.
     Break the file up into manageable pieces & create a book for it.

  4) Using the printout as a guide, start tagging text and importing
     graphics.

What? The graphics are gone too? Geeeeeeezzz....

  5) Use Acrobat to delete everything on a page except for the
     graphic, then export that page as an EPS file. Repeat as
     necessary.

  6) Clean up the graphics with Illustrator or tool-of-choice.


As an alternative, you can import the HTML files into Word and
then copy/paste over to Frame. Whether that actually saves time
over the other method is anyone's guess.

--
Larry Kollar, Senior Technical Writer, ARRIS
"Content creators are the engine that drives
value in the information life cycle."
    -- Barry Schaeffer, on XML-Doc

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