Irrespective of whether you are using embedded or linked images in your Word file, the images themselves will not form part of the exported XML file. Instead, the XML will contain pointers to external image files. Irrespective of how you handle images in Word, you will need to ensure that the filenames included in the XML pointers match the names of the actual external image files.

If you have embedded images in the Word file, one way of ensuring that the image files and the XML pointers match up is to have eXtyles export the image files as part of the XML export process. The names will also match up if the images were exported at Activation or Cleanup, provided that no changes have been made to the number of images in the file during subsequent processing.

If you use linked images, eXtyles can be set up to use the filenames from the various image links to generate the file pointers in the XML, again ensuring that the filenames and pointers match up.

If you have removed the images from the file, eXtyles will generate pointers automatically on XML export, basing the filenames in the first instance on the figure captions that it finds in the Word file, using a naming convention that is specified in your XML export filter. In this case, you will need to develop a procedure to ensure that the image filenames match the names used in the XML pointers. There are various ways to override or control the automatic naming in the XML file by using the Insert Graphic and Figure Panels tags from the eXtyles Insert Tags menu.

Automated image processing

One eXtyles customer has shared a handy tip with us if you need to do automated processing of image files on export to XML.

They have used the Mogrify image-processing software to convert all of the EPS files that are exported by MathType into PNG files automatically as part of their export process. This is possible by running Mogrify from a Command Line prompt as part of a <Launch> block on export. For more information on the use of the <Launch> block, contact eXtyles support.

However, Mogrify can apply other transforms to images or a sequence of images, including scaling (for example, to generate thumbnail versions of all of the images automatically), rotation, color reduction and more. More information about Mogrify is available at http://www.graphicsmagick.org/mogrify.html