Character Brief Export Template

[RPMiller]

I'm currently trying to create a Character Brief Export Template per the Writer's Guidelines. Just out of curiousity, how do you get the Character Name to appear in all CAPS and Bold?
I'm having a heck of a time.

[RPMiller]

Bumping...

[Simon]

&lt;span style="text-transform: uppercase; font-weight: bold;"&gt;<span style="text-transform: uppercase; font-weight: bold;">Character Name Goes Here</span>&lt;/span&gt;

[RPMiller]

Originally posted by dsimon
&lt;span style="text-transform: uppercase; font-weight: bold;"&gt;<span style="text-transform: uppercase; font-weight: bold;">Character Name Goes Here</span>&lt;/span&gt;

Thank you very much Dan! I appreciate it. I'm trying to get these characters exported so that the company can get it to press. Another quick question if I may?
I have been reading through all the help files and XML reference that I can find, and I must be missing something. I'm trying to get the Active Cost tag to NOT display in the export per the Writer's Guidelines, and I can't seem to get it to work. Any help?

[Simon]

Currently the Active Cost is part of the Power's description that appears whenever there are Limitations present.

One of the enhancements that will be present for v2 is to turn this off, if desired, so that Active Cost won't display.

[RPMiller]

Originally posted by dsimon
Currently the Active Cost is part of the Power's description that appears whenever there are Limitations present.

One of the enhancements that will be present for v2 is to turn this off, if desired, so that Active Cost won't display.

Well crap! I guess I'm going to have a lot of post-editing to do. What I don't understand is what good is the Active Cost tag? I had obviously falsely assumed that the reason for adding it would be so that you could control it's use.
Ok, I can live with the post editing, I'll write a macro to do that. To make that go easier, can I force the Active Cost to display inside of Exclamation points or something to set it off from the other text? I'm having a heck of a time wrapping myself around XML's use for some reason. There is some fundamental thing I'm missing. I know HTML and VB at an advanced level and yet struggle with XML. Is there a good tutorial or something you could recommend?

[RPMiller]

Originally posted by dsimon
&lt;span style="text-transform: uppercase; font-weight: bold;"&gt;<span style="text-transform: uppercase; font-weight: bold;">Character Name Goes Here</span>&lt;/span&gt;

Ummm... This is for an HTML export isn't it?? Oops.
Ok, I should have been clearer in my request. How do you make the name bold and in caps in an RTF Export?

[Simon]

Someone else will need to help you for the RTF equivalent....if there is one.

[JohnTaber]

Hi Durnin: There is not a way to do this with rtf that I could figure out...I did the rtf submission template. When you get done with the short format I would love to check it out. I was going to do one but I got busy. I was also gonna work on a Vehicle, Automaton, AI, and Computer version but again..time...

[RPMiller]

Originally posted by JohnTaber
Hi Durnin: There is not a way to do this with rtf that I could figure out...I did the rtf submission template. When you get done with the short format I would love to check it out. I was going to do one but I got busy. I was also gonna work on a Vehicle, Automaton, AI, and Computer version but again..time...

Apparently, Geoff Speare was able to do it so I posted a message to get his attention. Hopefully, he'll be able to help me.
I will send the Brief to Ben for posting as soon as I get it to work. I can't guarantee that everything will be per the Guidelines, but I want to get it close at least.
I also need to figure out a way to get the Active Cost out of the other Export Templates. I'm going to try a formatting option and than a post-edit macro to remove them.
I have about 140 characters that I have to Export for publication so I'm in stress mode right now.

[JohnTaber]

140! I feel sorry for you. I did 10 supers for a DH article and I thought I was gonna scream. I created a HD template to go with the rtf submission export template but it is still FAR away from the official submission guidelines. It is so much work. (P.S. If you want the template I created it is on my website. Use the link below.)

To be honest at some point I think Steve and/or Dan and/or folks at Hero needs to schedule time to rework the submission guidelines to make them a bit more reasonable and/or better yet maybe a bit easier to to with HD.

If you have a found a way to force CAPs in rtf please send me the info.

Anyway...my $0.02...

[RPMiller]

Ok, I finally got the Character Brief Export template finished. I have tested it with a couple characters and everything seems to be working. I am going to attach the code below for anyone that wants to try it out. I ended up going with HTML because I couldn't get the RTF format to work the way it should. This is by no means perfect, but it will get you real close to what HG's Writer's Guidelines are. Let me know if you have any ideas or "issues" with it.

[RPMiller]

I've noticed that the template has been downloaded 5 times so far. For those of you that tried it, is everything working and have you any comments?

I'm working on putting together a Word macro that will do some of the post editing. It should work like this: Export from HD, open the file with Word (latest versions have the capability to open HTML files), run macro, it will alphabetize and convert the resulting table to text. I'll post the macro as a zip when I finish it.

[SAVeira]

I like the new template. Thank you very much. Do you have any plans for an RTF version?


S.A. Veira

[RPMiller]

Originally posted by SAVeira
I like the new template. Thank you very much. Do you have any plans for an RTF version?

S.A. Veira

That depends. I originally set out to do an RTF version, but couldn't get the formatting to work correctly. I'm going to conspire with Geoff when I get a chance and see if he can make it work since he did the RTF WG templates that are already available. Of course, I would gladly except anybody's help as well.