Re: Need Good HTML Conversion Tool for Word Docs

Susan:

With all due respect. I suggest you are mixing apples and oranges
here.

When you place your documents on the web, there will no longer be
"pages" in the printed sense of the word. True, you can create a
separate web page for some part or parts of your documents, (such
as chapters) but due to screen sizes, browser differences and a
host of other variables, there is no way to set page length as
you would in a printed book.

As an example, look at the novels I have on the web.
http://www.temercraft.com/novels/
They are broken into chapters with each chapter becoming one long
page. (the equivalent of several printed pages)

If you are using MS word, the simple way to convert to HTML,
(other than simply saving the whole document as an HTML file), is
to copy your text to the clipboard and then open your template in
FrontPage and place your cursor where you want it and use
Control-V to paste it in. A little screen will pop up and proudly
announce the conversion is taking place automatically.

We do this dozens of times each month for our magazine. Many of
the contributions come to us as Word files. We copy and paste,
special character, tables and all, with few problems. (Sometimes
one needs to copy and paste some objects separately)

The only downside is that if some "typist" has used tabs all over
the place, you may have to go down paragraph by paragraph and
adjust the indentation. To my knowledge, no program anywhere can
adjust for all that tabbing.

The other way of course is to create your original document in
Word using an HTML template. You can do this by modifying an HTML
template to suit your needs and saving it as a template. The
downside to this method obviously is that it will not print out a
hard copy like a regular Word file would.

However, you can re-save a Word file as an HTML file using the
new extension.

Just like us, you seem to be finding that it is hard to get some
folks to understand that there are very fundamental differences
between printed documents and those on line.

When I first thought of putting my novels on the web, I simply
went back and re-saved each chapter as an HTML file. However, I
found that all my footnotes, headers and footers raised havoc
with common web page structure. Now I use the copy and paste
method and rarely have a problem. My original Word files work
fine for printing and my HTML files created with FrontPage do
their job on the web. I simply had to rethink how my footnotes
had to be presented. (I now place them at the end of chapters
with bookmark links)

Word and FrontPage are designed to work together seamlessly. It
is the differences in print and web structure that your group
will have to resolve. I know of no program that will do it for
you.

And finally, (thank goodness, you say), if you can come up with
Word 2000 and FP 2000 it will all be much easier as they are both
"web" applications. (I wish we had them--sigh)

Good luck and best wishes
Ted Temer
Temercraft Designs Redding, CA
temer(at)c-zone.net
http://www.temercraft.com
http://www.newsredding.com/


>
>I hope some of you will help point me and my colleagues in the
direction
>
>toward resolving our (so far) frustrating dilemma.
>
> Our tech writing group has been tasked with converting our MS
Word
>documents to HTML for online publication. The requirement that
> we use HTML, as opposed to PDF, was handed down from above and
is not
>an
>issue for debate. The choice of MS Word as our
>"desktop publishing" application is also not up for debate.
Given these
>parameters, we are desperately seeking an HTML conversion or Web
>authoring tool that is specifically designed for the conversion
of MS
>Word documents.
>
> We are currently using, and will continue to use, one template
to
> generate Word documents. These documents will have to be
>converted such that post-conversion cleanup takes less than a
few hours
> for a 200 page document. We are using a complex custom
> template for our hard copy documentation, but are permitted to
modify
> and simplify this template. Our template includes a TOC;
>chapter  title pages; automatic numbering for section headings,
figures,
>
> and tables; screen captures, technical diagrams (Visio), and
> flow charts; and an index. We consider automatic numbering an
important
>
> feature to retain, if this is possible without great
> compromise in other areas.
>
> We have already tested the following tools: MS Word,
Word-to-Web, and
>MS
> FrontPage. We tried Dreamweaver, but it seems that it
> cannot convert Word files.
>
> Our priority areas of capability for the conversion tool we
seek are as
>
> follows:
>
>
>   * Correct automatic numbering, where numbers contain chapter
and
>     section placeholders (e.g., 1.5)
>        o For section headings (text that follows must remain
properly
>          (formatted)
>        o For figures and tables
>          Note: The tools we've tested either number the lists
properly,
>          but don't indent properly, or vice versa. Some drop
the
>          chapter placeholder in the number (i.e., 1.5 becomes
5).
>   *  Correct automatic numbering of nested lists
>        o Properly sequenced and indented
>        o If interrupted by a paragraph that is not numbered,
will
>          resume proper sequencing and indentation of list
>   * Correct indentation of nested bulleted lists; use of a
variety of
>     bullets for different levels of indentation
>   * Ruling of tables (visible/invisible) kept as specified in
the MS
>     Word file
>     Note: When a table in a Word file contains both visible and
>     invisible borders, the file conversion makes all of the
rules in
>     the table visible.
>
>  We would like to find a conversion tool that can handle all
(or most)
>of
> these functions adeptly. Any recommendations would be greatly
> appreciated.
>
> Thanks.
> Susan Peradze
> Staff Technical Writer
> Periphonics Corporation
> 4000 Veterans Memorial Highway
> Bohemia, New York 11716
> susan.peradze(at)peri.com
>
>

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