Changing Initialization Files; About Initialization Files - Adobe FrameMaker 7.0 User Manual

Changing Initialization Files

You can customize your FrameMaker environment in many ways by editing initialization files. In some cases, you
may also want to edit the setup files referred to in these initialization files. This chapter describes the changes you
can make by changing settings in the initialization files.
About initialization files
Initialization files are text files that define many elements of your working environment. You can edit settings in these
files using FrameMaker or a text editor such as Notepad.
Important: If you open an initialization file in FrameMaker, you'll see a dialog box telling you that the file is of an
unknown type. Make sure that Text is selected in the dialog box, and click Convert to open it. When you're finished editing
the file, use the Save As command to save it as Text Only.
The initialization file contains settings such as default options for the Preferences dialog box, values for the Zoom
pop-up menu, and the names of dashed lines. It also gives the locations of dictionaries and other files that
FrameMaker needs to find as you work. These initial settings are made when you install FrameMaker on your system.
The settings in the initialization file are grouped under bracketed headings. Each heading tells the system how to
interpret the information that follows. A line that begins with a semicolon (;) is a comment and is not read by the
system.
User profile versions of
FrameMaker always stores a copy of the product initialization file, maker.ini, in install_dir. To save settings for
individual user profiles FrameMaker also stores a user's copy of maker.ini in UserProfile\Application
Data\Adobe\FrameMaker\7.0, where UserProfile is the location of user profile data for the current platform. For
more information about UserProfile and the location of customization files, see "Locating customization files" on
page 1.
When FrameMaker starts up it uses the settings in the installation version of maker.ini plus the settings in the user's
personal version of maker.ini as follows:
• FrameMaker reads all the entries in the installation version of maker.ini
• For single settings such as view options or recently visited files, if there is an entry in the user's personal version of
maker.ini, FrameMaker uses it to override the entry from the installation version
• For accumulated settings such as installed FDK plug-ins, FrameMaker adds the user's personal entries to the
entries found in the installaton version of maker.ini
To make a change to maker.ini that affects all users who will log onto a particular system, modify the settings in the
installation version of maker.ini. For example, you might want to register an FDK plug-in via this version of
maker.ini to ensure every user has access to the plugin. To restrict changes to a specific user you would modify that
user's personal version of maker.ini.
maker.ini
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