Hebrew project in FrameMaker11

[sebdea]

Hi,

I have read a post dated 2009 where someone asked about Righ-to-Left support in FM (http://forums.adobe.com/message/3080754#3080754). Now, FrameMaker is evolved to FM11. Is there any chance they included a feature for RTL languages while using an international version of FM11?

I even move forward with my question. I have FM10. Is there any chance to buy an upgrade to FM11 ME? Will that work with LTR languages?

Best regards,

Sebastian

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

All versions of FM are international, but I don’t think they support RTL languages – check the specs page on the Adobe website.

[Arnis_Gubins · Accepted solution]

Hi Sebastien,

RTL languages are still not supported in FM11.

[sebdea]

Hello Arnis and Jeff,

Thank you very much for your answers.

After searching for a solution it is generally said that using InDesign will help. No my question is as follows:

Could I import an XML/DITA generated from FrameMaker11 to InDesign?

I bever worked with XML. While I start reading lots of pages of documentations I want to know what is the very first and important step to be made. I do not know whether XML/DITA actually will set the styles, master pages etc. in InDesign directly. Shall I prepare an InDesign document to match the styles and master pages of a FrameMaker?

Considering that FrameMaker has couple of features that InDesign do not have I am wondering if this is a reliable solution. Wouldn't be better to recreate the document in InDesign and then export it as IDML for translating in Hebrew?

I go even further. Since FM do not support RTL languages when XML is translated into Hebrew will it be messed up?

I do not want you to teach me in an email all the XML secrest. Just to tell whether is a good solution or not and if it is what do I have to do first when preparing InDesign file for XML import.

Thank you for your support.

Best regards,

Sebastian

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Yes, you are correct that ID and FM are not the same - ID has been improving their long-doc support (a strength of FM) but some features are still not supported. Having no experience with ID, I can't tell you much about importing XML into it. I would suggest you download a trial of ID and play around wih it. Since you couldn't put Hebrew in FM to begin with, I'm not sure what sort of translation conversion you're trying to do.

[sebdea]

Dear Jeff,

Thank you. I do have InDesign. I am actually a newbie using FM. I am working for a translating agency and so far I used FM just to implement translations or to adjust in some cases the translations.

However, thank you for your reply and for your support. Much appreciate it.

Best regards,

Sebastian

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Ah, ok I see – you’re receiving LTR language files in FM (like English) and are looking to translate the content to a RTL language (like Hebrew). Yeah, that’s not going to work in FM. I don’t have any experience in translation, but don’t they use something called TRADOS (or something like that) to store translations in memory so that edits to the source language don’t result in completely new translations of the whole thing? How does the agency usually handle this LTR to RTL situation?

[sebdea]

Well, so far we worked with InDesign mostly and those couple of FM projects were in LTR languages. So, basically for IND or FM I export the original files as IDML respectively MIF. Once translated they are saved back as IND or FM. The workflow is quite simple and easy to work with.

In this particular case the client perhaps was suggested that exporting FM as XML and importing it into IND might work.

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Sounds like it’s worth a try – let us know how it goes ;>)

[sebdea]

OK. Thank you. I will keep you up-to-date once the client award the project.

Best regards,

Sebastian

[Matt S - Tech Comm Tools]

Id is great for importing XML, not great at exporting XML. It's best used in an unstructured environment, or as a conduit for publishing structured content.

[Shlomo Perets]

Free 1-hour webinar; no fluff, no hype, no nonsense...

Tuesday, July 7, 2pm Israel (Hebrew-language webinar):
Using FrameMaker 2015 for Right-to-Left / Hebrew Documents

A review of Right-to-Left and Hebrew support in FrameMaker 2015.

Discusses working at the document/page level and how to handle Paragraph/Character/Table formats.

Will also discuss and demonstrate various PDF / online outputs for Hebrew documents authored in FrameMaker.

Note: This webinar will be held in Hebrew. If you would like to attend a similar webinar in English, please write to training@microtype.com

[details/registration]