Cross-file links failing under Linux

Question

(Cross-posted to FrameUsers list)
FM 9 p250 on WinXP Pro SP3
Acrobat Pro Extended 9.3.2
I am  struggling with links across PDF files.  They all work in Windows, but  some work and some don't under Red Hat Enterprise 4 Linux.
I am  using the following directory structure to create a hierarchy of "menu"  pages with links to other PDFs:
C:\nCode Desktop 6.0 ISR2\nCode  Desktop 6.0 ISR2\source_docs\contents\Draft for .fm files and .book  files; C:\nCode Desktop 6.0 ISR2\nCode Desktop 6.0  ISR2\source_docs\contents\Draft\graphics for graphics.
There are  about 50 other directories for PDF documents (they are what you arrive  at using the menus), one for each .book and .fm file set, with a path  such as C:\nCode Desktop 6.0 ISR2\nCode Desktop 6.0  ISR2\source_docs\designlifetheory\draft.  This creates  designlifetheory.pdf. There are crosslinks to other pdfs from within  some of these files.
For the Contents "menus", I have created one  book per menu. Menus are a  single page long.
All of the books create single pdfs (i.e., not  multiple files per book). The books are all output to a single  directory, C:\nCode Desktop 6.0 ISR2\nCode Desktop 6.0  ISR2\Deliverables.
I am using the newlink and gotolink  commands.  The newlink commands are all on master pages.  The gotolink  commands are all on body pages. A typical gotolink would be "gotolink  map_of_help.pdf:helpmap".  This one seems to fail consistently on Linux.  I have tried using "gotolink map_of_help.fm:helpmap", which also  fails.  Should I be using ".fm" instead of ".pdf" in the link?
The  .pdfs are created using Print to Adobe PDF.  The PDF Setup is Settings:  Standard Job Options, View Generated PDF in Acrobat, Convert CMYK  Colors to RGB; Bookmarks: Generate PDF Bookmarks; Tags: Generate Tagged  PDF; Links: Create Named Destinations for All Elements and Paragraphs.
I  have tried placing all the books in a single directory using Save As,  with all the paths relative, and books open, and with books closed.  I  have tried dumping all the .fm files and .book files into the same  directory. I have tried outputting to various directories.  I have  combed the archives, and tried to follow Shlomo's training module on  "FrameMaker Books & Cross-File Links."
I don't seem to get  it, whatever it may be.
Any help for this newbie appreciated.

Answer 1

Your links look okay, directory-wise.
A link would be traversing the root directory if, say, the document is in some subdirectory below C:\nCode Desktop 6.0 ISR2\ and the target was in, say, C:\nCode Masters 6.0 ISR2\....blah blah or on a different disk.
One other thing: Maybe it's just me and my UNIX background, but using spaces in pathnames or filenames just feels like you're asking for trouble, especially if you want the end product to be portable to other platforms.
If the links are relative and they work on Windows, as you say they do, then my guess is that Reader on Linux is the problem. Try viewing them using xpdf on Linux and see if the links work then.
As matter of fact, I issue a very large manual set (69 manuals with approximately 400,000 links) for my Linux customers, and some time ago I abandoned Reader 8.1.2 on Linux in favour of xpdf because I didn't have the time to wait for a fix. The truth is, the links in Reader 6.0 didn't work either, and I was fed up with having to test every new Reader version that came out to see if it actually worked.
I'd be interested to know if you trace the problem to Reader on Linux, and if you find a Reader version later than 8.1.2 on Linux that works.
Dave