RE: Looking for a Frame+SGML 5.5 plug-in

[Dan Emory <danemory@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 02:14 PM 11/6/98 -0500, Schwedland, Steve wrote:
>No, the document is structured already.  I do not like the random number
>(actually letter) generator for Element Id's.  I would like to have a
>plug-in that will create a Unique ID for all of the elements so that I
>can reference them later from both within Frame and in the database.  

OK, now I understand.

If a plug-in were developed, it would have to do the following: At the
moment each new element having an UniqueID attribute is added, it would have
to enter a new unique ID in that element. And, if an element having that
attribute is copied and pasted somewhere else (leaving the original element
intact), the plug-in would have to be intelligent enough to replace the olde
ID with a new one. As I recall, what FM+SGML does in this case is assign the
new copied and pasted element a new object ID, and delete the old UniqueID
value from the attribute, leaving the attribute value blanky until a
cross-reference to it is inserted. Somehow, the plug-in would have to
piggy-back on that FM+SGML action that assigns the new object ID, and follow
that action up by also assigning a new UniqueID to it. That might be difficult.

It might be easier to do all this in the database, rather than with an
FM+SGML plug-in, allowing FM+SGML to assign its UniqueID value (call these
"temporary" ID's) in the "normal" way when an element whose UniqueID
attribute is empty is cross-referenced for the first time. But, each time
the document is checked back into the database, a database routine would do
the following:

1. It scans all of the checked-in elements for the presence of elements
(i.e., those created since the document was last checked back into the
database) having empty UniqueID attributes, and assigns a permanent ID to
each such element.

2. It scans all of the elements for the presence of FM+SGML-assigned
temporary ID's. Such temporary ID's would only exist in elements created
since the last time the document was checked back into the database, and the
cross-reference was also inserted before it was checked back in. In thse
cases, the database routine would replaces each "temporary" ID with the new
"permanent" ID. Then, for each such element whose temporary ID was replaced,
the routine would scan the entire database for elements whose IDREF
attribute contains the temporary ID, and replace it with the newly assigned
permanent ID. All that would be required to recognize the temporary ID's
would be that your numbering scheme's first character always begins with
something that FM+SGML never puts in the first character. 

Dan Emory
Dan Emory & Associates
FrameMaker/FrameMaker+SGML Document Design
and Database Publishing Specialists

Voice/Fax: 949-722-8971
E-Mail: danemory@primenet.com
10044 Adams Ave. #208
Huntington Beach, CA 92646


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