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Alex Bilsland recently sent me an email reminding me that I had promised
to summarize any responses that I got on a message I had posted several
weeks, if not months, ago. That message requested responses from anyone
who was using a database to store "parts" of documents, then extracting
those parts with routines or programs (cgi or perl scripts, perhaps) to
construct complete documents "on the fly."
Unfortunately, the only kinds of responses that I have gotten to this so
far have been of the "we are interested, too" variety. Norris Lawson, of
the Chicago STC chapter, did give me a call recently, and we discussed
using primary and secondary files, in a merge kind of situation to
produce documents. In that case, the primary file maintained the
sentences of a highly structured type of document, while the secondary
file had "records" of data that were inserted into the primary
sentences, to produce the completed sentences.
However, I have not talked to anyone who is using a true database and
programatic approach. If anyone hears anything about this type of
process, please contact me. Thanks.
--
Charles Cantrell
chc -at- ontario -dot- com
