Re: EDD Maintenance Techniques (Re: Frame+SGML: Prefix Rules and Attributes)

["Lynne A. Price" <lprice@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 09:26 AM 6/13/01 -0400, edunn@transport.bombardier.com wrote:
>In my EDD folder I have the complete EDD and several sub-folders. In one sub
>folder, I keep all the currently referenced Elements. In another I keep a copy
>of all the functional Elements. In the others, I keep the various non- and
>semi-functional fragments. I can then test works in progress by copying from the
>work in progress folder into the "current" folder. I can then return to the
>previous version by copying from the "Functional" folder into the "Current". If
>the work in progress works as expected, I can move it into the "Current" and
>"Functional" folders.

Sounds like a good organization. Do you use the element library for multiple
EDDs, or just for one?

>On another note: For your technical manual/training template. Are the different
>names (Chapter/Module) for the elements or just the formatting? The elements
>should all be the same and just the formatting should change (I'm assuming this
>is what you are doing). But instead of fussing with variable AND character
>formats, why not use conditional text? That way you can define elements and
>structure for both simultaneously, and conditional text automatically gives you
>indication of what is applied by character formatting.

Conditional text is a good tool for something that occurs just once. The element
tags occur several times in the EDD. To make the distinction with conditional
text, I'd need to retype the element tags and assign the condition tags with
each occurrence. There is a risk that I could make a mistake in any of these
repetitions. Furthermore, if I make any changes, I'd have to make them repeatedly.
Using a variable in the EDD, just like a variable in any other FM document, eliminates
the possibility of typos in some occurrences of a repeated string and also allows
all occurrences to be changed by editing a single definition.

By the way, the talk I gave on maintaining related EDDs at last year's FrameUsers
Conference mentions using variables, conditional text, and text insets in EDDs
and situations in which each is appropriate.

	--Lynne

Lynne A. Price
Text Structure Consulting, Inc.
lprice@txstruct.com
http://www.txstruct.com

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