2.1. The "Convert Document" sub-menu

How does it work?

All the "Convert Document" menu items first invoke XMLmind Assembly Processor to generate the realized document out of the assembly being edited and then, this realized document is converted to other formats (HTML, PDF, DOCX, etc) normally, using the DocBook XSL stylesheets.

What we call the realized document is the “flat”, monolithic, document (e.g. a DocBook 5.1+ book) specified by the means of the assembly.

This first processing step explains why the assembly being edited must have been saved to disk prior to be able to use any of the "Convert Document" menu items.

Menu items

[Note]

The "Convert to RTF", WML, DOCX, ODT, entries documented below are absent in XMLmind DocBook Editor. They are found only in XMLmind XML Editor.

[Tip]Using the profiling stylesheets

Conditional processing, also called profiling or conditional text, means that you can create a single XML document with some elements marked as conditional. When you process such a document, you can specify which conditions apply for that version of the output, and the XSLT stylesheet will include or exclude the marked text to satisfy the conditions. More information in DocBook XSL: The Complete Guide.

If you need to use the profiling XSLT stylesheets rather than the regular ones, use OptionsCustomize ConfigurationCustomize Document Conversion Stylesheets in XMLmind XML Editor - Online Help and select the corresponding stylesheet.

Convert to HTML, Convert to HTML [one page]

Converts the document being edited to multi page or single page HTML.

[Tip]Generating XHTML rather than HTML

If you prefer to generate XHTML 1.0 or 5 rather than plain HTML, use OptionsCustomize ConfigurationCustomize Document Conversion Stylesheets and select the corresponding stylesheet.

Convert to Web Help

Converts the document being edited to Web Help containing XHTML 5 pages.

Convert to HTML Help

Converts the document being edited to a .chm file. This command is disabled on platforms other than Windows.

For this command to work, the HTML Help compiler, hhc.exe, must have been declared as the helper application associated to files having a "hhp" extension. This can be specified by using the Preferences dialog box, Helper Applications section.

Convert to Eclipse Help

Converts the document being edited to Eclipse Help.

If you want Eclipse to display your Eclipse Help document in its help viewer, you must

  1. specify the following XSLT stylesheet parameters: eclipse.plugin.name, eclipse.plugin.id, eclipse.plugin.provider, prior to selecting DocBookConvert DocumentConvert to Eclipse Help;

  2. give to the output folder the name specified in eclipse.plugin.id;

  3. copy the output folder containing the generated Eclipse Help document to eclipse_install_dir/dropins/ and not eclipse_install_dir/plugins/.

Convert to EPUB

Converts the document being edited to EPUB.

Convert to RTF (Word 2000+)

Converts the document being edited to RTF (Rich Text Format) using XMLmind FO Converter (see http://www.xmlmind.com/foconverter/). The document generated by this command can be edited and printed using Microsoft® Word 2000 and above.

Convert to WordprocessingML (Word 2003+).

Converts the document being edited to WordprocessingML using XMLmind FO Converter. The document generated by this command can be edited and printed using Microsoft® Word 2003 and above.

Convert to Office Open XML (Word 2007+)

Converts the document being edited to Office Open XML (.docx file) using XMLmind FO Converter. The document generated by this command can be edited and printed using Microsoft® Word 2007 and above.

Convert to OpenDocument (OpenOffice.org 2+)

Converts the document being edited to OpenDocument (.odt file) using XMLmind FO Converter. The document generated by this command can be edited and printed using OpenOffice.org 2.

Convert to PDF

Converts the document being edited to PDF (Adobe® Portable Document Format, also known as Acrobat®) using RenderX XEP (see http://www.renderx.com/), if its plug-in has been installed, and Apache FOP otherwise (see http://xmlgraphics.apache.org/fop/).

All the above Convert commands display the URL chooser dialog box rather than the standard file chooser dialog box.

For all Convert commands except for the "Convert to HTML" command, you must specify the URL (Uniform Resource Locator) of a save file. The "Convert to HTML" command creates multiple HTML pages with a first page called index.html, therefore you need to specify the URL of a save directory.

Note that these commands can create directories on the fly, if needed to. For example, if you specify http://www.acme.com/docs/report43/mydoc.html as the URL of the save file and if directory report43/ does not exist, this directory will be created during command execution.