Using Text in External Files to Assign Long Descriptions to Images in FrameMaker
Assign long descriptions to images using external files when you have image descriptions that exceed 255 characters or if you want to use image descriptions in external text files to assign long descriptions to images.
To assign a long description to an image, your Stationery and template must have the ImageLongDescText marker type configured. Your output format must also support this feature.
The steps you use to assign long descriptions to image varies based on the version of Adobe FrameMaker you use. If you use Adobe FrameMaker 6.0, you use the ImageLongDescByRef marker. If you use Adobe FrameMaker 7.0 or later, you use an object attribute you create for the anchored frame to assign a long description to an image.
To assign a long description to an image using an external file in an Adobe FrameMaker source document
1. Create a .txt file that contains each image long description.
2. Place each image long description text file in a folder in the ProjectName\Formats\TargetName\Files folder for your project, where ProjectName is the name of your ePublisher project and TargetName is the name of your target.
For example, place the each image long description in the following location:
ProjectName\Formats\TargetName\Files\longdescriptions\imagelongdescription.txt
where ProjectName is the name of your ePublisher project, TargetName is the name of your target, longdescriptions is the name of the folder where you placed the image long description, and imagelongdescription is the name of the .txt file that contains the image long description.
3. In your Adobe FrameMaker source document, locate the anchored frame for the image to which you want to assign a long description.
4. If you are using Adobe FrameMaker 6.0, complete the following steps:
a. On the Graphics menu, click Tools to display the graphic tools palette.
b. Click the Text Frame icon.
c. Drag the cursor over the portion of the image where you want to insert the text frame that will contain the ImageLongDescByRef marker.
d. In the Create New Text Frame window, in the Number field, type 1, and then click Set.
e. Click outside the image, and then insert your cursor in the text frame.
f. On the Special menu, click Marker.
g. In the Marker Type field, select ImageLongDescByRef from the drop-down list.
h. If the ImageLongDescByRef marker type is not on the list, check with the Stationery designer to obtain the name of the marker type the Stationery designer created to support this functionality and then use the marker type specified by the Stationery designer. For more information, refer to
Implementing Online Features in FrameMaker.
i. In the Marker Text field, type the path to the .txt file that contains the long description you want to assign to the image.
For example, type:
./longdescriptions/imagelongdescription.txt
where longdescriptions is the name of the folder where you placed the image long description, and imagelongdescription is the name of the .txt file that contains the image long description.
j. Click New Marker.
5. Complete the following steps:
a. Select the anchored frame that contains the image to which you want to assign a long description using an external file.
b. On the Graphics menu, click Object Properties.
c. Click Object Attributes.
d. In the New or Changed Attribute area, in the Name field, type ImageLongDescByRef.
e. In the Definition field, type the path to the .txt file that contains the long description you want to assign to the image.
For example, type:
./longdescriptions/imagelongdescription.txt
where longdescriptions is the name of the folder where you placed the image long description, and imagelongdescription is the name of the .txt file that contains the image long description.
f. Click Add.
g. Click Set.
h. Click Set again to close the window.
6. Save your Adobe FrameMaker source document.
8. In Output Explorer, verify ePublisher assigned the long description to the image using the long description in the external file when it generated output by completing the following steps:
a. On the View menu, click Output Directory.
b. In the TargetName\ProjectName folder, open the page that contains the image to which you assigned the long description using an external file in Notepad and verify that the longdesc attribute references the external text file that contains the long description for the image, where TargetName is the name of your target, and ProjectName is the name of your project.