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mramshaw1-Visitor
1-Visitor
September 14, 2011
Question

WYSIWYG for tables in Editor view?

  • September 14, 2011
  • 55 replies
  • 11926 views

Several of our users are complaining that tables in the Editor view don't look like they do when composed in a print preview. Tables have no identation in our editor view but they have the standard 1" margin when you do a print preview and I was wondering if there was any way to have the indentation in the Editor view as well, as well as make it more WYSIWYG looking. I know it's last century technology 🙂

    55 replies

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    naglists1-Visitor
    1-Visitor
    September 14, 2011
    You should be able to cause tables to indent in the Edit Window display.
    You'll need to modify your screen stylesheet whether Styler or FOSI. (Is XSL
    an option? I forget ...) How you change how tables display will depend on
    which stylesheet technology you're using.

    For FOSI (and assuming you are using a different stylesheet for screen than
    print), you'll need to find this entry (assuming you are using the CALS
    table model):
    <e-i-c gi="table" ...<br="/>And add or modify this element:
    <indent leftind="1in" ...<br="/>
    Or something like that. If you're using the same stylesheet for screen and
    print, then it is possible the indent is applied only if the stylesheet is
    being called to print. Then you're looking for something like this related
    to the formatting of table:

    <specval attname="print-only" attloc="system-var" attval="#ANY">

    Or contrarily:
    <specval attname="editor-only" attloc="system-var" attval="#NONE">

    Be sure to caution your authors that they will be able to see less of their
    tables (or they will be scrunched up / mangled more tightly) than before.


    E
    ebenton1-Visitor
    1-Visitor
    September 14, 2011
    Just tell them that it's not WYSIWYG, it's WYSIKWYG (What You See Is Kinda What You Get).
    B
    berard1-Visitor
    1-Visitor
    September 14, 2011
    I remember Liz Fraley referring to it as WYSIOP - What You See Is One
    Possibility. The surprising thing is that term really resonated with our
    largely non-technical clinical writers, making them more open to writing in
    XML with metadata (attributes, etc) allowing our content to be used for
    static, interactive and print formats more easily. It also reduced the
    need to constantly modify our FOSI to try to mimic the final output, which
    was tedious and error-prone.

    keith

    N
    naglists1-Visitor
    1-Visitor
    September 14, 2011
    I think Suzanne Napoleon coined WYSIWYN ... Need.

    P
    ptc-19080751-Visitor
    1-Visitor
    September 14, 2011
    I don't recall that. Probably someone else. Actually,I look forward to the day when authors embrace WYSMYJE (What You See Makes Your Job Easier). What works for paper does not necessarily work for screen display.Attempting to replicate print output in the Edit window has many negatives, including: * Authors waste time trying to tweak the formatting to their liking.

    * The print font may be difficult to read onscreen.

    * The font size may be so small it requires zooming.

    * The font size or vertical white space may beso large itrequires extrascrolling.

    * Some formatting makes text difficult to read onscreen, especiallyin a screen-unfriendly font.
    A screen FOSI specifically designed to facilitate the authoring and editing processes saves time and effort. And it makes perfect sense for single-source/multiple outputs.

    There is a lot you can do with a screen FOSI and maybe a little ACL that can be very helpful to users. Hmmm ... would there be any interest in a presentation on Screen FOSIs at PlanetPTC 2012?

    Suzanne Napoleon
    www.FOSIexpert.com
    "WYSIWYG is last-century technology!"


    -----End Original Message-----
    E
    ebenton1-Visitor
    1-Visitor
    September 14, 2011
    Yeah, maybe a presentation called “Satisfying The WYSIWYG Zealots (As Much As Possible) With Screen FOSI”.
    G
    GarethOakes16-Pearl
    16-Pearl
    September 15, 2011
    I agree with all of this and making screen viewing/editing efficient is the primary concern.



    However, I can see where Mike is coming from. Tables always seem to be a special case because when you are authoring a table it is all about the column widths, breaking and so on. Most of our customers have us implement a "table preview" function for exactly that reason … eg. they can click in a table and select to preview and get a composed view back of that table straight away. I wonder if Mike would benefit from having something similar so his authors don't need to scroll through a print preview to find the one table they are working on?



    Just my 2c.



    -Gareth


    M
    mramshaw1-VisitorAuthor
    1-Visitor
    September 16, 2011

    Thanks for the input, everyone! I think for now just indenting the table will help. For the record, I agree that WYSIWYG is last century technology, but they haven't made me dictator for life here yet so I cannot enforce this upon others.

    K
    KathleenReisler1-Visitor
    1-Visitor
    September 19, 2011
    Why is WYSIWYG so last century? Everyone says that but maybe just the coding for it is last century. Witness the popularity of ipads and iphones where things look like what you expect them to look like.......
    E
    ebenton1-Visitor
    1-Visitor
    September 19, 2011
    Because in many modern editing systems your output can be one of several formats: text, WORD, RTF, PDF, PRINT/Paper, HTML, multiple flavors of IETM etc. etc. Should we choose our output selection first and then have our authoring environment reflect accurately and *PRECISELY* what our output will look like when we are done? What if our output will be multiples of these, which editing view do we use?

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