Importing and Converting non-Frame Images or Documents

To import a file into FrameMaker select Import from the File menu. You can import an image by reference or by actually including the file into your document. In general, you should import by reference if the file you are importing and the document are going to be in the same location all the time. Otherwise, you should include the file into the document so you need not worry about either file changing locations. Once you have clicked on OK, FrameMaker will import the file. If it is a graphics image, you will then need to resize or move the image to the desired location.

FrameMaker can easily import several types of graphics. This is, however, dependent on the platform on which you are using it. The following table lists the platforms (all Athena workstations running FrameMaker would fall in the category of Xwindows) and the types of graphics that can readily be imported:

		Mac	NeXT	 XWindows	SunView
        	---------------------------------------
Sun rasterfile   Y	 Y	     Y		   Y
EPSI		 Y	 Y	     Y		   Y
Mac EPSF	 Y	 Y	     N		   N
DOS EPSF	 Y	 N	     N		   N
Postscript	 Print   Y	   Print	 Print
TIFF		 Y	 Y	     N		   N
PICT		 Y	 N	     N		   N
MacPaint	 Y	 N	     N		   N
X11bitmap	 N	 N	     Y		   N
X11wd		 N	 N	     Y		   N

Print -- this means that the image is not visible in the document, but can be included and will show up when the document is printed out.

FrameMaker also has several filters to import documents from other word processors. The document types you can just open from within the program are:

Autocad (.dxf)

there are image quality and file size tradeoffs

Wordperfect (.wp)

converts from WP5.0 and 5.1

Microsoft Word (.word)

converts from Word 3.0 and 4.0

TROFF (.man,.me,.ms,.m,.1,.2,...,.8)

converts various troff formats including man pages. Can handle me, ms, and man macros. The quality of the conversion if fairly accurate.

Interleaf (.iaf)

convert from Interleaf 6.4 (TPS 4.1). The quality of the conversion is only mediocre.

Code (.c,.h,.C,.H,.perl,.pl,.ada,.m)

NOTE: Just be sure that your document has the corresponding extension listed next to the file types above.

The final conversion offered is not automatic. To convert a LaTeX file to FrameMaker you need to use:

la2mml file.tex

and then open file.mml in FrameMaker.

The quality of this conversion is reasonable, but you definitely need to doublecheck the imported text for random characters or commands that FrameMaker could not interpret.