Tuesday, September 11, 2007

20 Free Plugins for Adobe FrameMaker

Name: Book2PDF

Type: Freeware

OS: Windows

FM Versions Supported:5.5.6 and 6.0

Company Name: Mekon

Download link: http://www.structured-publishing.com/Software/A-Z/Book2PDF/index.jsp

Description:

  1. List generation for FrameMaker 5.5.6—This free Mekon plugin enables Adobe FrameMaker to successfully generate lists in the form of a Table of Contents from a FrameMaker book.
  2. Printing to PDF for FrameMaker versions 5.5.6 and 6.0—When a book is printing to PDF as individual files, any cross-references or links going to other folders will be lost. This free Mekon plugin allows you to print directly to PDF without losing any of the links.

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Name: Book-level Conditional Text

Type: Freeware

OS: Windows

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6

Company Name: ElectroPubs

Download link: http://www.electropubs.com/downloads.html

Description: Conditional text is one of FrameMaker's best features when it comes to single-source authoring. Unfortunately, before the release of Version 6, FrameMaker only allowed you to control conditional text at the file level. With 50 separate files in a Book, changing Conditional Text settings can be a tedious and error-prone business.

This utility displays the familiar Conditional Text dialog box on a .BK (book) file's menu. Change the Show/Hide settings, and the settings of all files in the book are automatically updated!

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Name
: BookLooker Plugin

Type:Freeware

OS: Win

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6 and 6.0

Company Name: Cudspan Tools

Download link: http://www.freeframers.org/freeware/cud/personales/cud/cssIndex.htm

Description:

Part of Cudspan Tools. Searches across books and performs other book-wide actions.

  1. Locks and unlocks files
  2. Turns changebars on and off and clears changebars in entire book
  3. Bookwide finds of strings, marker text, marker types, cross-references, unresolved cross-references, and document- and book-level hunt for paragraph overrides; creates hypertext linked document of results

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Name: DITA FMx

Type: Freeware

OS: Windows

FM Versions Supported: 7.2

Company Name: Leximation

Download Link: http://www.leximation.com/dita-fmx/

Description: Lets you create and edit DITA XML files in FrameMaker.

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Name
: DoBatch

Type: Freeware

OS: Windows

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6, 6.0 and 7.0

Company Name: Cudspan

Download Link: http://www.freeframers.org/freeware/cud/personales/cud/cssIndex.htm

Description: Part of Cudspan Tools. Runs batch processing in documents and books. Save as
MIF, Filtered, ViewOnly, or document; Update a book or document; Import formats; Run another plugin on a book or document.

  1. Requires the CudLog plugin.
  2. DoBatch can now use your installed export filters to save as other file types.
  3. This includes HTML and XML. See the updated docs for more information. (5/23/01)
  4. NEW: DoBatch now saves as PostScript. (9/14/01)

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Name: DZbatcher

Type: Freeware

OS: Windows

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6, 6.0 and 7.0

Company Name: Datazone

Download Link: http://www.datazone.com/english/overview/download.html

Description:

  1. Print documents using a `print settings' document to control how the documents will be printed.
  2. Convert files from Frame document (binary) format to Frame MIF (Maker Interchange Format) or vice versa. You can also batch-convert files to FrameViewer or FrameMaker locked format.
  3. Convert files to Acrobat PDF format.
  4. Import formats from one document into many other documents.
  5. Automate conversion of MS Word, and many other external document types, to FrameMaker.
  6. Automate the updating of variables, cross-references and text insets across a large collection of documents.

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Name
: CudLog

Type: Freeware

OS: Windows

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6, 6.0 and 7.0

Company Name: Cudspan

Download Link: http://www.freeframers.org/freeware/cud/personales/cud/cssIndex.htm

Description: Part of Cudspan Tools. A logging utility that is used by many of these other
plugins.

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Name
: DoBatch

Type: Plugin/Freeware

OS: Win

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6, 6.0, 7.0

Company Name: Cudspan

Download Link: http://www.freeframers.org/freeware/cud/personales/cud/cssIndex.htm

Description: Part of Cudspan Tools. Runs batch processing in documents and books. Save as
MIF, Filtered, ViewOnly, or document; Update a book or document; Import formats; Run another plugin on a book or document.

  1. Requires the CudLog plugin.
  2. DoBatch can now use your installed export filters to save as other file types.
  3. This includes HTML and XML. See the updated docs for more information. (5/23/01)
  4. NEW: DoBatch now saves as PostScript. (9/14/01)

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Name
: FreeWheel

Type: Plugin/Freeware

OS: Win 9x or Windows NT

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6, 6.0

Company Name: FreeWheel

Download Link: http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/2060/freewheel.html

Description: Here is a utility to get away from FrameMaker's annoying habit of NOT letting you use the scroll wheel on your mouse. Freewheel provides mouse wheel support for applications that do not directly support the IntelliPoint mouse wheel.

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Name
: Hunt Overrides

Type: Plugin/Freeware

OS: Win

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6, 6.0, 7.0

Company Name: Cudspan

Download Link: http://www.freeframers.org/freeware/cud/personales/cud/cssIndex.htm

Description: Part of Cudspan Tools. Lists instances of paragraph format overrides,separating overrides that are only due to page-breaks from other overrides. The list is a hypertext document you can use to navigate to the override instance.

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Name
: Import Formatted Tables

Type: Plugin/Freeware

OS: Win 9x

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6

Company Name: ElectroPubs

Download Link: http://www.electropubs.com/downloads.htm

Description: Use this DLL to import comma-delimited text into pre-formatted table definitions.

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Name
: Leximation

Type: Plugin/Freeware

OS: Win

FM Versions Supported: 5, 6, 7

Company Name: Leximation

Download Link: http://www.leximation.com/tools/

Description: There are several free plugins for FramMaker@Leximation.

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Name
: MarkerWorker

Type: Plugin/Freeware

OS: Win

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6, 6, 7

Company Name: Cudspan

Download Link: http://www.telecable.es/personales/cud/cssIndex.htm

Description: Part of Cudspan Tools. Generates a list to represent all markers of a specified type in a book or document. Once you generate the list, you can modify the marker text and then rebuild all the listed markers with your new marker text.

Obvious uses include:

  1. Globally editing index markers
  2. Translating marker content
  3. Checking and correcting hypertext markers.

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Name
: MIFBrowser

Type: Application/Freeware

OS: Win

Company Name: Graham Wideman

Download Link: http://www.wideman-one.com/gw/tech/framemaker/mifbrowse.htm

Description: Provides a tree view of MIF contents.

Name: MIFMuncher

Type: Application/Freeware

OS: Win

Company Name: HyText Consulting

Download Link: http://stc-carolina.org/tiki-index.php?page=MIF%20Muncher

Description: MIF Muncher massages a FrameMaker MIF (Maker Interchange Format) file to extract information. This version extracts stylesheet (paragraph tag) information from the MIF file and generates a tab-delimited ASCII text file that can be pulled into your favorite word processor and easily formatted into a table.

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Name
: PgfWhopper

Type: Plugin/Freeware

OS: Win

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6, 6.0,7.0

Company Name: Cudspan

Download Link: http://www.freeframers.org/freeware/cud/

Description: Part of Cudspan Tools. Lists and deletes unused paragraph formats, character formats, and conditional text tags.

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Name
: RefIcons

Type: Plugin/Freeware

OS: Win

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6, 6.0,7.0

Company Name: Cudspan

Download Link: http://www.freeframers.org/freeware/cud/

Description: Part of Cudspan Tools. Inserts icons next to paragraphs. Just design a format/icon pair in your document, then use a single command to save the pair in the RefIcons palette. You can then use the format/icon pair in any document.

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Name
: Remove Local Formatting

Type: Plugin/Freeware

OS: Win 9x

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6, 6.0

Company Name: ElectroPubs

Download Link: http://www.electropubs.com/downloads.html

Description: This DLL removes "local" formatting from FrameMaker documents. Local
formatting can be defined as formatting that does not match the definition of the text in the Paragraph Catalog.

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Name
: TocBreaker

Type: Plugin/Freeware

OS: Win

FM Versions Supported: 5.5.6, 6.0, 7.0

Company Name: Cudspan

Download Link: http://www.freeframers.org/freeware/cud/

Description: Part of Cudspan Tools. Remembers page breaks and line breaks in your generated lists. Very useful in the later stages of a project when you have decided on custom breaks in the generated files, but you need to regenerate from time to time.

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Name
: TOOLBOX Basic

Type: Plugin/Free

OS: Win, Mac

FM Versions Supported: 5.x, 6.0, 7.0

Company Name: System Gmbh

Download Link: http://www.systec-gmbh.com/en/sites/downloads_epub.php

Description: Paragraph/Character Formats

  1. Delete all or unused paragraph, character, cross-reference, variables, and table formats with one click.
  1. Add paragraph & character formats to catalogs.
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Disclaimer: This list was compiled for the advantage of my fellow technical writers all over the globe. The list includes all the latest information as on the date on posting. For more information on the product, you can always check the developer's website.

I researched the internet and complied all the information. I did not develop this information and do not consider this to be a copyrighted document. In many cases, descriptions have been copied directly from the creator’s web site.

Happy FrameMaking!
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