Re: A conditional-text caveat

[Thomas Michanek <tmi@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Tue, 13 Apr 1999, Carolyn Stallard wrote:

> FM5.5.6 on WinNT: I've discovered the hard way that File | Import |
> Formats... | Conditional Text Settings does not do what I expect (and
> what I think is reasonable to expect) in the following situation:
> [...]
> This does not seem reasonable to me.  Applying conditional settings
> should do just that, and not leave unwanted conditions in the show
> list.  Anyway, be warned, if you use conditional text and add new
> books to a shared collection.

As stated on page 296 in the 5.5 User Guide, importing formats
*merges* the definitions from one file with the definitions in
the original file. This means that no formats/definitions/settings
are deleted. Only formats with exactly the same name are replaced.

That is, if the document/template you import from does not contain
the format you wish to control (in this case hide a conditional tag)
then the import function cannot affect this format. In the case of
conditional tags, the show/hide settings are actually not stored
separately in the document; they are stored as part of the definition
of the conditional tags. That is why the show/hide setting cannot
affect other tags than those actually existing in the document.
(You can see this if you look at the MIF version of a document.)

This should be pointed out more clearly, and an option should exist
to completely *replace* definitions when importing formats. This
could have undesirable side-effects, though; for example deleting
a cross-reference format would turn all cross-refs using that format
into plain text.


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Thomas Michanek, Documentation Manager, Telelogic Tau
Telelogic AB, Teknikringen 9, SE-58330 Linkoping, SWEDEN
PHONE:  +46 (0)13 211450   <--  *** new from April 1 ***
EMAIL:  mailto:Thomas.Michanek@telelogic.com
WWW 1:  http://www.telelogic.com
WWW 2:  http://hem1.passagen.se/framers
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See you at the Telelogic User Conference '99, May 19-21, in
Barcelona, Spain: http://www.telelogic.com/news/userconf.asp


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