1-Visitor

Question

using relative graphic paths

Forum|Forum|19 years ago
November 2, 2006
17 replies
1457 views

hi all

is there a way in arbortext editor (5.2 windows) to insert or change
absolute graphic paths to relative ones?

when we access graphics that are in a subfolder of the document, we
get realtive paths. but we have to insert relative paths to access
graphics in a folder structure like

+ project
+ documents
+ images

so the path for a graphic should be ..\images\graphic.gif. arbortext
editor inserts always an absolute path. since graphic_relative_path
needs an absolute path to convert paths and there is always a
different absolute path to graphics.

any help is appreciated.

frank

B

bjarne.melin

1-Visitor

Hi,

In Preferences, specify a list of directories to search for graphic
files.

Make sure you have all paths to your graphics listed in
Tools/Preferences/File Locations, Graphics.
The path separator on windows is ';' - and remember, no space!

///Bjarne

is there a way in arbortext editor (5.2 windows) to insert or change
absolute graphic paths to relative ones?

F

frank.marent

Author

1-Visitor

hi bjarne

> In Preferences, specify a list of directories to search for graphic
> files.

the paths in which we'll have the graphics are unpredictable and we
will have hundreds of these folders with graphics... any way to
handle this?

frank

B

bjarne.melin

1-Visitor

Hi Frank,

I dont know any elegant solution for that case.
However, the online 'help472' says: There is no limit for directories,
but maximium allowed charcters in file locations: Graphics is 4095,
so I think most of the locations will fit.

Editor will search all the listed paths for graphic files and only
insert the file name.

///Bjarne

A

AndyEsslinger

1-Visitor

Be careful, the path separator is ';' for Windows but is ':' for Unix.

I use something like this for Windows:
set APTGRPATH=.\gfx;\\server\sharename\graphics

And this for Unix:
set APTGRPATH=./gfx:/home/graphics/category

If the graphics are on the same filesystem you can probably change
absolute paths to relative, but on different filesystems you would
probably be stuck with absolute paths.

As a general rule I do not allow spaces or underscores in graphic names
because it causes problems of one kind or another.

Hope this helps,
-Andy
\ / Andy Esslinger F-22 Tech Order Data
_____-/\-_____ (817) 777 3047 LM Aero Box 748
\_\/_/ Fort Worth, TX 76101

F

frank.marent

Author

1-Visitor

andy, bjarne

your information is very helpful but i can't predict all possible
pathes used for graphics. how can i change *any* path in arbortext
editor to a relative path to the document?

frank

E

ebenton

1-Visitor

I do not know any details about your infrastructure or who creates your
documents and how you get them or where they and the graphics are
stored, but I strongly suggest that you (as an organization at least)
get some control over this.

A

AndyEsslinger

1-Visitor

Frank,

You cannot set an "infinite" number of graphics paths in your
preferences so that every possible directory is the default graphics
path. The very idea is counterproductive.

What do you mean by: "... relative path to the document"? I would think
you mean either .."relative path to the graphic" or "relative path from
the document".

As to how you change it, it depends on how you set up your graphics.
All of my stuff is SGML, but some DTDs are set up for graphic entities
and some are set up for graphic filenames. There may also be some XML
way that I wouldn't know anything about.
Examples:

DCF setup for graphic Entities:
<graphic element="graphic" entity="boardno" />

The boardno would contain the entity name and the entity declaration
would contain either a relative path or absolute path to the graphic or
a Formal Public Identifier.

As a SYSTEM reference:

Or as a FPI reference from a catalog:
cgm>

<graphic boardno="quatz"></graphic>

DCF setup for graphic Filenames:
<graphic element="grphprim" filename="external-ptr" />

The external-ptr would contain either a relative path or absolute path
to the graphic.

<grphprim external-ptr=".\gfx\graphicfile.cgm"></grphprim>

Hope this helps,
-Andy

\ / Andy Esslinger F-22 Tech Order Data
_____-/\-_____ (817) 777 3047 LM Aero Box 748
\_\/_/ Fort Worth, TX 76101

G

gary.t.nadeau

1-Visitor

Frank,

When you are speaking relative path, are you saying your graphics are in
the same directory as your smgl/xml document or a sub directory?
My thought would be to first break the fingers of whoever is making
absolute paths, then create a perl script to go through the document and
change the graphic entities. We've did a similar thing when we forced a
solid directory structure on our authors. Now if there is a problem, we
just quickly launch that script and is fixes the document.

Gary Nadeau
Tech Lead - Data Support
Maintenance Information Systems
Boeing Integrated Defense Systems - St. Louis
' Phone: (314)233-5231
* Email: gary.t.nadeau@boeing.com

F

frank.marent

Author

1-Visitor

[ed]

> I do not know any details about your infrastructure or who creates
> your
> documents and how you get them or where they and the graphics are
> stored, but I strongly suggest that you (as an organization at least)
> get some control over this.

educational enterprise with around 500'000 pages of content to
handle. we have thousends of projects, books, lessons that are
handled between authors and editors and our printing house. we have
control over all our content and can still not predict all possible
pathes to all projects/graphics in 25 different decentralized locations.

[gary]

> My thought would be to first break the fingers of whoever is making
> absolute paths, then create a perl script to go through the
> document and
> change the graphic entities. We've did a similar thing when we
> forced a
> solid directory structure on our authors. Now if there is a
> problem, we
> just quickly launch that script and is fixes the document.

that helps to see that there might *not* be an arbortext editor
onboard solutions to force relative paths to graphics...? perl is a
possible solution for that problem, but we would like to find an
arbortext editor onboard solution.

[andy]

> What do you mean by: "... relative path to the document"? I would
> think
> you mean either .."relative path to the graphic" or "relative path
> from
> the document".

sorry for that. i mean a folder structure like

+ project
+ documents
+ images

where there is always a ..\images\graphic.gif path to the graphic
images. and the problem is, that when we are working (in an xml
environment) with a graphics *subfolder* everything is fine and we're
getting a 'image\graphic.gif' path. as soon as we're working with a
'sister folder' for the graphics as shown above, we're getting
absolute paths from arbortext editor.

it is no problem to solve this absolute path problem let's say in
xslt for later processing. but we should work in arbortext editor
already with relative paths. is there a way?

thanks for all people taking time so far to help me on this.

regards
frank

E

ebenton

1-Visitor

I realize that this might be expensive, but you might want to invest in
a server to store the graphics and get your contributors to send you the
graphic files as well as the document files. Then you could store them
all in one place and use it for your APTGRPATH value. Managing them
might be problematic, but probably only if you needed to keep a history.

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