Technical Communication & Information Design
A new version of the Aptana IDE is available with a new colorization engine, Eclipse Monkey support and “tons of enhancements”.
One very special treat supported by the new build (#15637) is an iPhone Development Plugin that adds preview support for iPhone applications, so you can see how your app will look on the iPhone.
So while it’s not exactly the SDK so many were expecting June 11, it might prove useful nonetheless—and I promise, that’s all I have to say about the iPhone today—honest! 
One issue that is frequently encountered in online Help development is a Microsoft security “fix” that prevents display of content in CHM files opened from a network. Typically, the CHM file itself is opened and the table of contents is visible, but the content pane on the right remains empty.
On corporate networks, users can often get around this issue by copying the CHM to a local disk instead of opening from a network drive. When linking to CHMs on an intranet:
If your intranet Web page uses the HTTP URL scheme to link to .chm files, security update 896358 may prevent users from seeing topics in the .chm file. Replacing an HTTP file path with a UNC file path can make it possible again to open .chm files from the Web page.
For more information, see the Microsoft support knowledge base article entitled “You cannot open HTML Help files from Internet Explorer after you install security update 896358 or Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1″ at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/902225/.
In an earlier post, I described a situation in which WebWorks AutoMap throws a spurious Error communicating with FrameMaker message when a job is not scheduled with a valid user name and password.
Quadralay support has since confirmed this defect, which they describe as follows:
If your AutoMap job does not complete successfully, and it returns errors in the log regarding failed communication with FrameMaker, it’s possible that it was not able to run the job from the Windows scheduler (even if you are running it manually) due to invalid credentials.
That is, when you set up a job, you must provide a valid user name and password to schedule the conversion. If a job is executed, and it can’ t log in correctly, it may report errors in communicating with FrameMaker (because it can’t even communicate effectively with the system). To resolve the issue, right-click on the the job in the AutoMap interface and choose Schedule Job. If you’d like to schedule it for automated conversion, do so in the Windows task scheduler dialog that appears. Otherwise, just click OK. You’ll be prompted for a user name and password. Enter the correct credentials, click OK, and then run the job as usual.
If you’ve ever wrestled with WebWorks AutoMap, you may have seen the following messages in a log file at some point:
Attempting to Start FrameMaker communication...
Error communicating with Adobe FrameMaker.
These messages suggest that AutoMap can’t find FrameMaker (or vice versa), and if that’s the case, Quadralay offers a few suggestions in a TechNote.
But today I found out (the hard way) that these errors may in fact have nothing to do with the connection between AutoMap and FrameMaker…
Continue reading ‘WebWorks — Error communicating with FrameMaker’
The interface artists at Sofa are working on a new Mac OS X Subversion client called Versions, which is due out for public beta release “any moment.”
While there are a few Subversion clients for Mac like svnX and cross-platform GUI front-ends such as RapidSVN and SmartSVN, even the names seem to suggest that none really manage to deliver the ease of use Mac users have come to expect.
No, it’s not all about eye candy—anyone that uses Subversion is typically smart enough to figure it out anyway—but even hard-core programmers benefit from good interaction design, efficiency and a solid user experience. And hey, if more programming tools had decent interfaces, maybe the applications they are used to create would be a bit more pleasant as well…
Or, as the people on the Sofa say:
To create good software, development teams should spend at least half their time thinking about what and how they want to communicate. Preferably even more. We want to create good software and collaborate with others to help make end-user experience a central focus in their development efforts.
While test-driving Aptana recently, I found the absence of a Tile command for editor tabs absolutely vexing!
While this is probably old hat for Eclipse veterans, I was pleased to discover that there is a way—albeit somewhat elusive for those new to the Eclipse platform.
As is often the case when you’ve been using Windows for far too long, there are much easier ways to do things—so simple that you sometimes don’t even think to try them. This is one of those cases, and the answer is as simple as drag-and-drop.
You just select an editor tab and drag it to an edge of the editor area to dock the editor to that side. To restore it, drag the tab back to the top.
Writing in the [Adobe Technical Communication blog] [1], FrameMaker Product Manager Aseem Dokania announced that Adobe is looking for [FrameMaker 8 beta testers] [2]. If you’re interested in participating in the Prerelease Beta 2 program, [sign up here] [3].
At the [STC conference] [4] in Minneapolis, several Adobe employees reportedly indicated that FrameMaker 8 is scheduled to ship before the end of the year.
Beginning in the fall of 2007, the Technische Universität Berlin is set to launch a graduate program in Human-Centric Communication offering both master’s studies and a PhD program.
The H-C3 Initiative seeks to promote development of technologies that provide flexible and intuitive communications approaches for the good of mankind. This innovative program follows a vision of Human-Centric Communication offering flexible and intuitive support in accessing situation-dependent information as well as in exchanging information with others. More than 50 academic groups are contributing their expertise to this initiative, especially the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, as well as 11 non-university research institutes.
Application deadline for online registration is June 25, 2007.
Tired of paying hundreds of dollars every year or so to upgrade your Web development environment? Has the manufacturer discontinued support of your tool of choice? Upset with nasty activation procedures that treat you like a criminal when you pay for software and then have the gall to switch machines or update your hardware? Sick of the platform lock-in? Me too!
There are several free alternatives out there for Web developers who need solid cross-platform support. One of the most ambitious and promising candidates is Aptana, an Eclipse-based environment geared toward Web development. I’ll definitely be taking a closer look at this over the next few days.
Komodo Edit is a free, multi-platform, multi-language editor for Web coding in (X)HTML, CSS, dynamic languages such as JavaScript, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby, Tcl, & Ajax technologies. The list of features includes autocomplete and calltips, syntax checking and coloring, code snippets and folding, project management and collaboration aids—in short: everything you’d expect from a modern editor, especially considering the (nonexistent) price tag. Since Komodo is built on Mozilla technologies, it also supports XPI extensions, which provide a great platform for extensibility.
A commercial IDE is also available for $295, which includes support for CVS, Perforce and Subversion source code control plus various debugging tools, access to browser-server communication, and a few other goodies that help you “walk the DOM” or craft complex regular expressions. If you decide to spring for the full-blown IDE, the user-based license allows you to use the software on any of the supported platforms—a big plus if you work on Linux, Mac OS X and Windows—no nasty platform lock-in!