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Microsoft’s SGML Author for Word is designed to convert between native SGML documents and Word. It uses specialized templates to enable structured authoring in SGML by creating a Word document that you can save as SGML. Version 1.0 was released in 1994.
Avalanche and SoftQuad offer companion products—Avalanche SureSTYLE and SoftQuad Enactor—that help you use this product. SureSTYLE applies consistent styles to Word documents so that they can be converted easily to structured SGML by SGML Author for Word. Enactor has an interface similar to Word’s. It enables you to validate native SGML documents by using context-sensitive menus.
Features. GML Author for Word is essentially a conversion filter that enables you to save Word files as SGML and to open SGML files in MS Word. After installation, you have your choice of where to put the program icons. Installation modifies the Word menus and creates new subdirectories under the winword directory. As with most Word add-on tools, you use styles intensively and you must map your DTD to the styles on your Word template. You do this with an association file, which is what SGML Author actually creates. SGML Author comes with templates and ISO character sets that make this process easier, as well as sample files on which you can practice conversions.
The conversion process happens with the SGML converter program, which operates rather invisibly behind the Word interface. Whenever you save a document as SGML or open an SGML document instance in Word, the converter does its magic. Table 26.5 describes the basic components of SGML Author for Word.
| Module | Description |
|---|---|
| SGML Author | This is the program in which you create the association (MAP) file that the converter uses to translate Word styles into SGML tags. |
| Converter program | This program operates transparently but does the real work for this application. It uses the MAP file intensively. |
| Word templates | These templates enable easier structured authoring within Word. You can create your own templates, too. For macros to be active in your SGML authoring templates, the template must have an associated INI file. |
| Sample conversion files | The sample documents come with applicable MAP, INI, DOT, DCL, and DTD files. |
| ISO character sets | Specialized character sets and an ISO equation set are included. |
| Help files | The help file and the system administrator’s guide that come with the package are useful. |
SGML Author for Word contains the essentials for creating valid SGML document instances. It was apparently designed for authors who must author documents but not design document types. To create DTDs, you need to create text files with Word or buy another tool specifically for that task. SGML Author for Word gives you everything that you need to map Word paragraph and character styles to a DTD of your choice. It enables authors to create Word documents according to that structure.
DTDs and Output Specifications. SGML Author for Word does not provide specialized tools for creating DTDs. You can design a structured authoring interface for authoring documents in Word. You must create the DTD with another tool. The program does a parsing check on the DTD when you associate the DCL file, however, and it shows you the parsing errors in a Notepad file.
SGML Author does not support external output specifications. It assumes that the document is presented only in Word. You can design several presentations in Word for a single DTD and document instance, however.
The closest to an output specification that you can come is to map a DTD to more than one Word template for conversion from SGML to Word. This gives you multiple appearances for the same SGML document. You can create several formats by adding the letters prn (for presentation) to Word templates for a single authoring template. For example, if you use the sample DTD, you can create SAMPRN1.DOT and SAMPRN2.DOT for different presentations of the same content and structure.
You can map a single DTD to multiple DOT files—but only one at a time. When you convert a single SGML document instance into a Word document, you are asked to select the declaration file (DCL), the association file (MAP), and the SGML authoring template (DOT or INI, which launches the DOT file). All these files must be ready before you convert the document.
Note:
Descriptors in SGML Author for Word associate Word styles with the markup in the DTD. Simple descriptors map to discrete elements, and complex descriptors map to nested elements. MAP files are the association files that contain the descriptors and their default values.
When you author an SGML document, you can create multiple MAP files for different Word presentation formats. You control the default values of descriptors during conversion. Therefore, you can alter the appearance of a MAP file as you want.
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