8.11. The "Change Document Conversion Parameters" dialog box

This dialog box is displayed by menu item OptionsCustomize ConfigurationChange Document Conversion Parameters. This dialog box allows to specify the XSL style sheet parameters (e.g. paper.type=USLetter) used when converting the document being edited to other formats (e.g. PDF, HTML, etc).

Procedure 4. Adding a user-defined parameter

  1. Select the conversion for which you want to specify parameters by using the "Group of parameters" combo box.

    In the above screen shot, the user has selected the conversion of DocBook documents to PDF or PostScript.

  2. Click on the Add button.

    Tip

    If, for example, you want to redefine paper.type from A4 to USLetter as shown in the above screen shot. Select the paper.type parameter by clicking on it and then click on the Add button. This will spare you the effort of retyping paper.type as the name of the parameter you want to add.

  3. Specify the name of the parameter and its value in the dialog box displayed by the Add button and then click OK.

    The value of a parameter may contain whitespace, including newline characters.

  4. Click OK if you are done or use "Group of parameters" combo box and the Add, Edit and Remove buttons to specify more parameters.

In the above screen shot:

Tip

The Documentation link is supposed to open in your favorite Web browser the reference manual of the XSL style sheet parameters.

Therefore, If you select a parameter by clicking on it and then click on the Documentation link, you should be able to read the documentation of this parameter.

However, this is not guaranteed to work because:

  1. This generally requires an access to the Internet.

  2. This documentation is not always available. For example, there is no documentation about the XHTML XSL style sheets yet. In such case, you need to send a support request to the public mailing list to learn how the document conversion process can be parametrized.

Procedure 5. Modifying a user-defined parameter

  1. Select the conversion for which you want to specify parameters by using the "Group of parameters" combo box.

  2. Select the parameter to be modified by clicking on it.

  3. Click on the Edit button.

    Predefined, grayed, parameters cannot be modified.

  4. Specify the value of the parameter in the dialog box displayed by the Edit button and then click OK.

    Tip

    It also possible to change the name of the parameter here. Doing this will simply add a new parameter or replace an existing one.

    In fact, the Add and Edit buttons may almost be used interchangeably.

  5. Click OK if you are done or use "Group of parameters" combo box and the Add, Edit and Remove buttons to specify more parameters.

Procedure 6. Removing a user-defined parameter

  1. Select the conversion for which you want to specify parameters by using the "Group of parameters" combo box.

  2. Select the parameter to be removed by clicking on it.

  3. Click on the Remove button.

    Predefined, grayed, parameters cannot be removed.

  4. Click OK if you are done or use "Group of parameters" combo box and the Add, Edit and Remove buttons to specify more parameters.

8.11.1. The "Parameter Set Chooser" dialog box

The "Change Document Conversion Parameters" dialog box has a Parameter Set menu which allows to load and save named parameter sets. A parameter set is the set of all the XSL style sheets parameters specified by a user using the "Change Document Conversion Parameters" dialog box. This facility is almost indispensable to deal with the DocBook profiling XSL style sheets. Using such style sheets requires the user to quickly switch from one parameter set (e.g. containing profile.condition=newbie) to another (e.g. containing profile.condition=expert).

Figure 16. The "Parameter Set Chooser" dialog box

The "Parameter Set Chooser" dialog box

Reset

Removes all the parameters currently specified by the user in the "Change Document Conversion Parameters" dialog box. The effect of Reset is thus to restore the stock configuration by removing all the user's customizations.

Example: parameter paper.type=USLetter is specified in both the docb.toPS.transformParameters and docb.toRTF.transformParameters groups. Selecting Reset from the Parameter Set menu means removing these two occurrences of the paper.type parameter.

Load

Displays the "Parameter Set Chooser" dialog box to let the user specify an existing parameter set. The contents of this parameter set is then used to overwrite all the parameters currently specified by the user in the "Change Document Conversion Parameters" dialog box.

Example: the user loads a parameter set called "USLetter" containing just paper.type=USLetter in both the docb.toPS.transformParameters and docb.toRTF.transformParameters groups. Selecting Load from the Parameter Set menu means removing all the currently specified parameters from all the parameter groups and then adding paper.type=USLetter to both the docb.toPS.transformParameters and docb.toRTF.transformParameters groups.

Save

Displays the "Parameter Set Chooser" dialog box to let the user specify the name of a parameter set. The integral contents of the "Change Document Conversion Parameters" dialog box at the save time is then copied to this parameter set.