format probems converting from Classic to nisus express

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peridot
Posts: 47
Joined: 2005-12-22 05:02:16

format probems converting from Classic to nisus express

Post by peridot »

All my formatting has been lost. For example, centered material is now flush left...double spacing is now single spaced...quote marks have been replaced by a symbol that looks like a capital o with a curly topknot...indented first lines of paragraphs are now flush left...em dashes are gone, replaced by another unknown-to-me symbol....is this correctable? if so, how? this is a 350 page ms so this is a major issue.... thanks for your help...
dshan
Posts: 334
Joined: 2003-11-21 19:25:28
Location: Sydney, Australia

Format Problems

Post by dshan »

How did you convert your Classic document to NWX?

1. Did you drag and drop the Classic document onto NWX (some have reported format problems when doing conversions like this).

2. Copy and paste from NW Classic to NWX (absolutely not the way to do it, guaranteed problems will ensue).

3. Did you just open the classic document from within NWX using the standard "File"->"Open..." dialog (this is the preferred method and seems to work best).
peridot
Posts: 47
Joined: 2005-12-22 05:02:16

thanks for your reply....

Post by peridot »

I opened the file from within Nisus Express but all the formatting problems I described above remain...Do you have any other ideas?....Actually, I'm amazed that the different versions of Nisus don't seamlessly work with each other....I've emailed Nisus help but they haven't answered...at least not yet...VERY frustrated!!! thanks again for your input....
dshan
Posts: 334
Joined: 2003-11-21 19:25:28
Location: Sydney, Australia

Post by dshan »

Sadly for Nisus Classic users, as they say right up the front of the NWX User Guide:

"Nisus Writer Express is all new, it is not a port of Classic Nisus Writer. It is not like any version of Nisus Writer that has come before."

They're not kidding.

Having said that you can open most Classic docs in NWX and it will handle the conversions okay. You do seem to be having extreme problems where almost all formatting info has been lost. It sounds like this document must be unusual in some way. Is this an English language document? Does it use standard fonts? Does it use multiple columns, tables, layers or some other unusual/advanced formatting?

Have you tried converting other smaller, simpler Classic docs to NWX? Same problems with them? Try creating a new, small (1-3 pages or thereabouts) document in NWC with simple formatting and using standard fonts like Times Roman or even Courier and then open that in NWX, does that convert okay? If it does then it sounds like your big doc uses some advanced formatting features that are not supported in NWX.

If that's the case then try using NWC to save your ms in RTF format (under another name) and then open that file in NWX and see if that converts properly (or at least better).
peridot
Posts: 47
Joined: 2005-12-22 05:02:16

Post by peridot »

Hi dshan....The doc is plain vanilla, English language, helvetica, double spaced manuscript (it's a novel), no charts, diagrams, lists or other "fancy" formatting...Really, it could not be more basic. My husband & I just sent another book to our publisher...the ms was created in Classic...publisher used MSWord...so we converted from Classic to MSWord & that seemed to work OK...We were wondering if we converted this current doc (the novel) into MSWord & then opened it in Express, if that might work...have you had any experience with this?

I forgot to mention that even the chapter headings (just called Chapter 1,2,3 etc) completely disappeared in the attempted transfer...

Thanks once again for your ideas & input. I appreciate your help.
dshan
Posts: 334
Joined: 2003-11-21 19:25:28
Location: Sydney, Australia

Conversion Problem

Post by dshan »

Hmm that's interesting. I'd certainly test a smaller Classic document to see if NWX can correctly convert that - use same double-spaced, Helvetica, ms with headings format like your ms uses but make it just a couple of pages long. If that converts okay (it should, people have certainly converted bigger more complex Classic docs to NWX than that) then it seems like it must be the size of your ms that's the problem (I don't know if anyone has ever tried converting a 350 page Classic document before).

I'd next try saving the ms in Classic as an RTF file and open that in NWX. RTF is NWX's native file format so it minimises the amout of conversion required to get it into NWX. Sure you could try saving it as an MS Word .doc file from Classic but then Classic first has to convert it from Nisus format into Word format (I'm assuming Classic doesn't work like Express does when creating MS Word files - Express just creates an RTF file and gives it a .doc suffix) and then NWX has to convert that back into RTF, that's a lot of unnecessary conversion where things could go wrong. Keep it simple, try RTF first.
peridot
Posts: 47
Joined: 2005-12-22 05:02:16

problem solved

Post by peridot »

Just want to let you know that I finally hired a tech expert to help since nothing worked. After a conversation with George at Nisus, it turned out that the document in question had been corrupted during the transfer from OS 9 to OS X...So the problem wasn't with Nisus....Again thank you for your input...I hope my experience will help someone else...
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