Check map

Conditional Processing Profile

Displays a dialog box allowing to specify a conditional processing profile (a .ditaval file) which is to be applied to the map being edited and also the medium targeted by this map. The conditional processing profile is used by the Check Map command and also by all the Convert commands found in the Convert Document menu.

The target medium specified in this dialog box is used only by the Check Map command. If you specifically target a print form (PDF, PostScript, RTF, etc) for your deliverable, check Print. In any other case, check Screen.

Figure 1. The dialog box displayed by menu item "Conditional Processing Profile"

Remember Note that the values specified in the above dialog box are remembered for use during subsequent editing sessions. For example, in the case of the above screenshot, if you reopen the same map later, this map will still be filtered by print.ditaval and its target medium will still be Print, and this even if you do not explicitly use menu item Map → Conditional Processing Profile during the new editing session.

Check Map

Extensively check the map being edited. This task which can be lengthy is run in background. While this task is running, a non-modal dialog box displays all the errors and warnings found in the map being edited, its submaps and all the topics referenced by these maps. If no errors or warnings are found, the dialog box is automatically closed. Otherwise it stays opened allowing you to review each error or warning. After you are done, you'll have to close the dialog box by clicking Close if you want to be able to re-run Check Map.

Figure 2. The dialog box displayed by menu item "Check Map"

As you can see it in the above screenshot, clicking on an underlined filename or URL opens the corresponding topic or map in XMLmind XML Editor and selects the element having the error or a warning.

Convert Document menu

Note The "Convert to RTF", WML, DOCX, ODT, entries documented below are absent in XMLmind DITA Editor. They are found only in XMLmind XML Editor.

Attention The items of this menu are all disabled if the document being edited needs to be saved to disk.

Convert to XHTML

Convert to XHTML [one page]

Converts the document being edited to multi page or single page XHTML 1.0.

Convert to Web Help

Converts the document being edited to Web Help containing XHTML 5 pages.

Convert to HTML Help

Converts the document being edited to a .chm file. This command is disabled on platforms other than Windows.

Requires:

1. Download and install Microsoft®'s HTML Help Workshop.
2. Declare the HTML Help compiler, hhc.exe, as the helper application associated to files having a "hhp" extension. This can be specified by using the Preferences dialog box, Helper Applications section.

Convert to Eclipse Help

Converts the document being edited to a directory containing various files for use by the Eclipse Help system.

Convert to EPUB

Converts the document being edited to an .epub file.

Convert to RTF (Word 2000+)

Converts the document being edited to RTF (Rich Text Format) using. The document generated by this command can be edited and printed using Microsoft® Word 2000 and above.

Convert to WordprocessingML (Word 2003+)

Converts the document being edited to WordprocessingML. The document generated by this command can be edited and printed using Microsoft® Word 2003 and above.

Convert to Office Open XML (Word 2007+)

Converts the document being edited to Office Open XML (.docx file) . The document generated by this command can be edited and printed using Microsoft® Word 2007 and above.

Convert to OpenDocument (OpenOffice.org 2+)

Converts the document being edited to OpenDocument (.odt file). The document generated by this command can be edited and printed using OpenOffice.org 2.

Convert to PDF

Convert the document being edited to PDF.

Changing the look and contents of the files generated by the Convert Document menu

1. Specifying custom XSLT stylesheet parameters. This is done by selecting any of the items of menu "Convert Document" and then, when the URL chooser dialog box is displayed, clicking "Document conversion parameters" to expand the conversion parameters pane.
   For example, adding parameter center with value "fig table" allows to center figures and tables in the generated files.
   The reference manual of the parameters of the XSLT stylesheets used to perform the conversion is found in XMLmind DITA Converter Manual - XSLT stylesheets parameters. This reference manual can be directly accessed from the "Document conversion parameters" pane.
2. Using menu item Options → Customize Configuration → Customize Document Conversion Stylesheets is also a relatively simple way to influence the layout and style of the deliverable (PDF, RTF, HTML, etc) which results from the document conversion.
   The document being edited is converted to other formats by the means of XSLT stylesheets. This menu item allows to:
   • select an XSLT stylesheet other the default one,
   • create a custom XSLT stylesheet on the fly,
   • invoke a specialized editor —XMLmind XSL Customizer— to modify a user-created XSLT stylesheet.
   However, when the document being edited is converted to an HTML-based format (Web Help, EPUB, HTML Help, etc), the HTML pages which are automatically generated by the aforementioned XSLT stylesheets are styled mainly by CSS stylesheets. When this is the case, this menu item allows additionally to:
   • select a CSS stylesheet other the default one,
   • create a custom CSS stylesheet on the fly,
   • invoke a helper application (generally, a text editor) to modify a user-created CSS stylesheet.
3. To a lesser extent, changing the options of the XMLmind DITA Convert (ditac) preprocessor. This is done by using Options → Customize Configuration → Preprocessing Options.
   For example, selecting option group "Convert to PDF, PostScript" and then selecting "Generate as backmatter" in the Index combobox allows to add an index at the end of the generated PDF files.
   More information about this facility in Section 6. Preprocessing options.

Note that a technical writer is not expected to know which parameter, option or style is to be specified to get the desired effect. Unless she/he is the local guru, a technical writer is expected to post a support request to the xmleditor-support public, moderated, mailing list in order to learn this. But at least the three above facilities allow her/him to customize her/his deliverables without having to hand edit configuration files.

The "Edit topicref" dialog box

Figure 3. A "Edit topicref" dialog box used to edit a <bookabstract> (a kind of <topicref> found in the <frontmatter> of a <bookmap>)

• If you want to set the @href attribute of the edited or newly inserted <topicref>:
  1. Click the Browse button and use the file chooser to select a file containing one or more DITA topics.
     After the topic file is selected, the status fields of the dialog box are updated to reflect the type and title of the first topic found in the file. The "Topic ID" combobox is updated too and contains the IDs of all the topics found in the selected file.
  2. In case the file selected in the previous step contains several topics, optionally select the ID of the target topic. This option adds a fragment #topic_ID to the value of the @href attribute.
• If you want to set the @href attribute of the edited or newly inserted <topicref> to a newly created topic, click the Create button. This displays the same dialog box as menu item File → New. Make sure to create a DITA topic.
• If you want to set the @navtitle attribute of the edited or newly inserted <topicref>:
  1. Type the title of the <topicref> in the "Navigation Title" field.
  2. Optionally click "Override default navigation title" if you want this <topicref> title to replace the referenced topic title in the deliverable (HTML, PDF, RTF, etc) which is to be generated out of the DITA map. This option adds a locktitle="yes" attribute to the edited or newly inserted <topicref>.