Cryptosmith

I’ve been using Framemaker to create large documents for almost two decades. I’m currently participating in an email discussion group of Frame users, and someone asked about comparing Microsoft Word and Frame. Someone else suggested Googling for the answer, since lots of people like to talk about it.

So, here is my own contribution to the question.

I use both Frame and Word on a daily basis. I use Word to draft reports for customers since that’s the format generally expected. I use Frame for writing books or other documents that I don’t need to distribute in an editable form. Frame works in two modes: structured and unstructured, and I’ve been writing books with unstructured Frame since Version 4 came out.

Instead of listing the strong points of Frame and Word, let me list weak points of each:

Weak points of Framemaker

• Hardly anyone uses Frame. There’s rarely any point in emailing Frame documents to people. Fortunately, both of my publishers have a production organization that knows/understands/loves it.
• The vendor, Adobe, doesn’t take the product seriously. This is shown through lackluster advertising, upgrades, and support. It reminds me of Multics under Honeywell, for the Multicians out there.  I’m astonished that the program is in as good a shape as it is. I’m always expecting another “We’re dropping Frame” announcement.
• Since it’s not taken seriously, there are rough edges in the user interface. Today, even the simplest text editor software understands “click and drag.” Not Framemaker. When the scroll wheel became a common GUI feature a decade ago, Frame required an extra release or two before the scroll wheel worked reliably.
• The analytical and statistical tools are weak or nonexistent. There’s a hokey interface that performs “word count,” and that’s about it. There are no analytics of average sentence complexity or grade level. While on one level I’m not confident that an algorithmic analysis will provide authoritative answers, I’d like to see how my different chapters compare.
• Important features use complicated interfaces that are hard to master through pure trial and error. I was initiated into the arcane secrets of section numbering by the Wizard Sheldon, who could make Framemaker sing soprano. You really need training to do advanced things like TOCs and indices, either in person or from a clear and complete written explanation. I’m only tackling indices this time because there’s a readable chapter on it in O’Keefe et al’s Unstructured Framemaker 8 (and because the publisher isn’t doing the index himself).
• There’s no outlining feature with expand/collapse and a distinction between headings and text, like you have in MS Word. While I don’t find Word’s outline feature very effective, it’s better than almost all 3rd party outliners.

Originally, Frame ran on Sun’s Unix workstations, and then on the Macintosh; and was eventually ported to Windows. When Apple moved to OS-X, Adobe dropped Mac support of Frame. I’ve been primarily a Mac user on and off since its introduction in ’84. I run MS Windows (under VMWare) for one reason: to run PC-only programs, and Frame is the one I use most often.

Weak points of MS Word

Here are ways Word has failed me over the past decade, even when working with bright people who seem to have mastered the more arcane aspects of Word.

• If you want a consistent document, you need to put it all in one file. This is especially true if you appreciate the quaint tradition of numbering page 1 with a “1″ and putting “200″ on the 200th page. Maybe they’ve fixed all that by now: I’ve mercifully not had to deal with a giant Word document recently.
• If the document gets too big (100+ pages), random things start failing. In a previous version, I remember seeing bullet symbols randomly disappear from bullet lists when the document reached 100 pages.
• I can’t make cross references work as cleanly and reliably in Word as they work in Frame.
• I can’t control a figure’s location as reliably in Word as I can in Frame.
• I can’t make chapter or section or figure or table numbering work as cleanly and reliably in Word as it works in Frame.
• I can’t change an individual paragraph’s format as cleanly in Word as I do in Frame. When I try to apply a Word style or a format or whatever to a paragraph, I get a bunch of questions about whether I’m trying to redefine the style or globally apply this paragraph’s format to other things, or something else irrelevant.
• I can’t reliably make a global change to a paragraph format and propagate it to other paragraphs with the same format tag. Word seems to require a series of weird and unrelated steps to do this. I just choose “Change all paragraphs” in Frame’s Paragraph dialong, and it works.

Over the years I’ve learned how to fix some of my gripes about Word, but the fixes haven’t always survived past the next product upgrade.

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