Importing Glossary entries

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bennetty
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Importing Glossary entries

Post by bennetty »

Hi,
Does anyone have a solution for creating a Glossary other than manually entering the terms and definitions.

I currently have all this information in a Google doc and wondered if there is a way to import this.

Any help would be much appreciated.

Thanks
wclass
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Re: Importing Glossary entries

Post by wclass »

At the recent meeting of the quite new Melbourne Flare Users Group (MFUG: http://melbflareusergroup.wordpress.com ... /mfug-aug/) we discussed this very topic. Our esteemed guest speaker, Tony Self, provided a step by step guide of going from a Word table of definitions to a Flare glossary text file.
Basically you need to get under the hood and do a bit of find and replace to wrap the terms in the appropriate XML tags. I have done something very similar using EXCEL (copied Word table into the columns, put the XML tags into the surrounding columns, and saved as text). It's very quick!
The link above takes you to the MFUG site with the notice of the August meeting - browse around the resources to find further information from the talk.
Margaret Hassall - Melbourne
bennetty
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Re: Importing Glossary entries

Post by bennetty »

Thanks for this Margaret - It worked!

I am now very happy :-)
sdcinvan
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Re: Importing Glossary entries

Post by sdcinvan »

Happy Friday all,

I am finally adding a glossary to each of my main projects and I was disappointed that Flare doesn't [appear to] support a glossary library. In other words, a master glossary where you maintain all your glossary terms and Flare picks the terms that are only relevant to each document. The alternative is that you must maintain multiple glossaries...but it seems rather inefficient if you must add and/or change terms across multiple glossaries.

Considering that Flare doesn't support anything like that (I submitted a feature request # 93377), how do you maintain glossaries, assuming multiple documents and different glossaries with a number of shared terms?
Thanks,
Shawn

If you think this is a good idea, I encourage you to submit a feature request: https://www.madcapsoftware.com/feedback ... quest.aspx
Shawn in Vancouver, Canada
Main tools used: Flare 11.x, InDesign, Google Docs, Lectora, Captivate.
Report bugs: https://www.madcapsoftware.com/feedback/bugs.aspx ▪ Feature requests: https://www.madcapsoftware.com/feedback ... quest.aspx[/i]
Nita Beck
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Re: Importing Glossary entries

Post by Nita Beck »

@Shawn,
For one of my clients, we maintain the entire collection of glossary terms (which, BTW, we do as individual topics rather than as text in a glossary file) in a global project. Local projects can then import either specific glossary topics or the entire set, as needed. And in anticipation of the day when management says, "Hey, let's produce a 'Glossary of <CompanyName> Terms,'" we're poised to produce said document.
Nita
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sdcinvan
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Re: Importing Glossary entries

Post by sdcinvan »

Nita Beck wrote:@Shawn,
For one of my clients, we maintain the entire collection of glossary terms (which, BTW, we do as individual topics rather than as text in a glossary file) in a global project. Local projects can then import either specific glossary topics or the entire set, as needed. And in anticipation of the day when management says, "Hey, let's produce a 'Glossary of <CompanyName> Terms,'" we're poised to produce said document.
I am assuming that your glossaries are static. Some of the terms used in my glossary will change over time, so I am reluctant to maintain many different glossaries. Also, I just find that duplicating glossary terms across multiple files is inefficient.

I am thinking of creating a glossary builder tool to write out custom glossaries. At least, I would only need to maintain a master glossary. The glossary.flglo file appears to be a simple XML file so it shouldn't be much of a challenge.
Shawn in Vancouver, Canada
Main tools used: Flare 11.x, InDesign, Google Docs, Lectora, Captivate.
Report bugs: https://www.madcapsoftware.com/feedback/bugs.aspx ▪ Feature requests: https://www.madcapsoftware.com/feedback ... quest.aspx[/i]
sdcinvan
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Re: Importing Glossary entries

Post by sdcinvan »

sdcinvan wrote:
Nita Beck wrote:@Shawn,
For one of my clients, we maintain the entire collection of glossary terms (which, BTW, we do as individual topics rather than as text in a glossary file) in a global project. Local projects can then import either specific glossary topics or the entire set, as needed. And in anticipation of the day when management says, "Hey, let's produce a 'Glossary of <CompanyName> Terms,'" we're poised to produce said document.
Shall I assume that these glossaries are static?
Some of the terms used in my glossary will change over time, so I am reluctant to maintain many different glossaries. Also, I just find that duplicating glossary terms across multiple files is inefficient.

I am thinking of creating a glossary builder tool to write out custom glossaries. At least, I would only need to maintain a master glossary. The glossary.flglo file appears to be a simple XML file so it shouldn't be much of a challenge.
Shawn in Vancouver, Canada
Main tools used: Flare 11.x, InDesign, Google Docs, Lectora, Captivate.
Report bugs: https://www.madcapsoftware.com/feedback/bugs.aspx ▪ Feature requests: https://www.madcapsoftware.com/feedback ... quest.aspx[/i]
Nita Beck
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Re: Importing Glossary entries

Post by Nita Beck »

Yes, my client's glossary terms are pretty static at this point. We end up editing / adding only on occasion.

BTW, are you aware that a glossary term in an .flglo file can also link to a topic? You can either enter the term's definition right in the .flglo file (but then you're limited to text only) or can link the term to a topic. We've got some glossary term definitions that link to other definitions, that include tables and/or images, or that include several paragraphs of narrative.

CAVEAT: We're not including the Glossary tab in our HTML5 output nor are we using (very many) inline links to glossary definition popups. I've not explored what Flare does with a term's definition that comes from a topic when it goes to build the Glossary tab or when using glossary definition popups.
Nita
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sdcinvan
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Re: Importing Glossary entries

Post by sdcinvan »

Nita Beck wrote:Yes, my client's glossary terms are pretty static at this point. We end up editing / adding only on occasion.

BTW, are you aware that a glossary term in an .flglo file can also link to a topic? You can either enter the term's definition right in the .flglo file (but then you're limited to text only) or can link the term to a topic. We've got some glossary term definitions that link to other definitions, that include tables and/or images, or that include several paragraphs of narrative.

CAVEAT: We're not including the Glossary tab in our HTML5 output nor are we using (very many) inline links to glossary definition popups. I've not explored what Flare does with a term's definition that comes from a topic when it goes to build the Glossary tab or when using glossary definition popups.
Hello Nita,

Thanks. Yes I am aware of assigning a glossary to a topic. I had to look it up, here: http://webhelp.madcapsoftware.com/flare ... argets.htm# to make certain that I understood.
But it really won't help in my desire to only have a single master glossary, where Flare creates a list of only the terms relevant to the particular document.

This reminds me of my disappointment that MadCap only went 1/2 way. What I mean is that I can pop-up definitions of just the relevant words, in a master glossary, but I cannot list only the relevant in a glossary at the end of the document. Flare does kind of the reverse of what I need. :cry:
Shawn in Vancouver, Canada
Main tools used: Flare 11.x, InDesign, Google Docs, Lectora, Captivate.
Report bugs: https://www.madcapsoftware.com/feedback/bugs.aspx ▪ Feature requests: https://www.madcapsoftware.com/feedback ... quest.aspx[/i]
Kim in GA
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Re: Importing Glossary entries

Post by Kim in GA »

These notes were circa 2014 and I'm afraid I was unable to find Tony Self's notes - is there now a way to import glossary entries from my (extensive) Excel file, please?
Nita Beck
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Re: Importing Glossary entries

Post by Nita Beck »

Flare doesn't have a native importer for that. But Mattias Sander, an active member of the Flare community, offers a free plug-in that can do exactly that, among a whole lot of other very handy things. It's available at https://www.kaizenplugin.com/.
Nita
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RETIRED, but still fond of all the Flare friends I've made. See you around now and then!
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