Dear friends and experts
In my script FM-biblio the following is a key task:
- An RTF file contains lines with the search and the replace strings:
{Daube 1989 #9}»(Daube 1989)The » denotes a TAB
- For every line in the RTF:
- Set up the Find parameters (using the search string)
- Find and replace as long as successful (Russ Ward method)
The whole script was developed in FM-13 times (and you find a lot of discussion about it in this forum). Now with FM-14 the Find/Replace loop turns out to be a vabanque game.
My test document is just two pages with 18 search items (some occur multiple times) and i have 11 replace items in the RTF.
The first item in the RTF is often not replaced in the FM doc.
I can repeat the find-replace step of the script multiple times. Sometimes I need to do so 3 times until also the first item is processed (revert to saved between the trials).
➔ What can be the reason for this behaviour? Timing?
For my extensive test series I did not change anything on the script. It is located in %UserProfile%\Docuemnts\Adobe Scripts\
Starting with FM-15 I saved the document as MIF and did the tests 3 times.
FM-15: Of 3 trials 1 successful; FM-14 3/1; FM-13 3/1; FM-12 3/2; FM-11 3/3; FM-10 3/3
These tests 'mifed down' the document from FM-14 to FM-10, hence removing a lot of not used stuff. And now I repeted the tests:
In all FM-versions up to FM-15 success is 3 of 3!
➔ The more complex the FM file, the less reliable the Find/Change function.
But something else bothered me during the tests: sometimes I got error messages in the log:
"undefined is not an object" on script line 193, which reads
var inputFile, prompt, docFile;
Then I just restarted FrameMaker and tried agian: No message then...
➔ ExtendScript is not reliable at all.
➔ How to conquer such obstacles?
I have added here only the find/replace function and the function setting up the find parameters:
function FindAndReplaceString (activeDoc, findString, replaceString, loopMax) { //=================
// Replace string by another
// Function returns replacemtCounter
// Since we have collected only in doc.MainFlowInDoc, we replace only in this flow
// loopMax used as emergency back door - twice the # of initially found citations
// We do not have an initial TextSelection, hence start directly at the first paragraph
// Source: Russ Ward in https://forums.adobe.com/message/3888653 giFMbib_LvlTrace += 1; ZTrace ("FindAndReplaceString"); var tr = new TextRange(); var restoreTR, frame = 0, loopCounter = 0, replacementCounter = 0; var findParams = new PropVals(); var firstPgf = activeDoc.MainFlowInDoc.FirstTextFrameInFlow.FirstPgf; tr.beg.obj = tr.end.obj = firstPgf; // set up the starting text range as the very beginning tr.beg.offset = tr.end.offset = 0; // of the flow. We'll move straight from beginning to end. trSaved = tr // to come back after work
//We don't need the find to wrap because we are controlling the flow from beginning to end. findParams = GetFindParams (findString); // Get the find parameters for finding string, case sensitive InitFA_errno (); // reset - it is write protected tr = activeDoc.Find(tr.beg, findParams); // and do an initial find to get started. while(FA_errno === Constants.FE_Success && loopCounter++ < 2*loopMax) { //find and replace loop as long as we keep finding
ZLog (" Replacement = «" + replaceString + "»") activeDoc.TextSelection = tr; // set up the text range to clear the original text activeDoc.Clear(0); // clear it activeDoc.AddText(tr.beg, replaceString); // insert the new text at the original beginning of the text range tr.beg.offset += replaceString.length; // lets jimmy the text range in memory to place it directly after // the string we just inserted, so the find picks back up after that. if(FA_errno === Constants.FE_Success) { // increment our return counter - does not work replacementCounter++; } InitFA_errno (); // to be used to track the progress of the find and replace tr = activeDoc.Find(tr.beg, findParams); // something screwy happened while we were replacing text. } activeDoc.ScrollToText(trSaved); // we're done. Restore the document to it's original area of display giFMbib_LvlTrace -= 1; return replacementCounter;
} // --- end FindAndReplaceString
function GetFindParams (string) { //===============================================================
// Get/set the find parameters
// Returns find parameters in the function
// Consider string, case;
// Source; Rick Quatro
if (gbFMbib_Verbose) {giFMbib_LvlTrace += 1; ZTrace ("GetFindParams");} var findParams = AllocatePropVals (2); findParams[0].propIdent.num = Constants.FS_FindText; findParams[0].propVal.valType = Constants.FT_String; findParams[0].propVal.sval = string; findParams[1].propIdent.num = Constants.FS_FindCustomizationFlags; findParams[1].propVal.valType = Constants.FT_Integer; findParams[1].propVal.ival = Constants.FF_FIND_CONSIDER_CASE; if (gbFMbib_Verbose) {giFMbib_LvlTrace -= 1;} return findParams;
} // --- end GetFindParams