Generating WebHelp/HTML After Upgrading from RoboHelp for Word X3

[Guest]

My client is looking to change the way they generate help for an internal application. Until now, they've been using RoboHelp for Word X3.  I was able to import the existing project into RoboHelp 10 and generate "Primary Layout (WebHelp)."  I opened the generated help in IE and FireFox and found the Table of Contents, which generated well.

Most but not all of the individual help pages will not open, however. Those that will not open are in CHM format. FireFox is reporting errors like "Firefox doesn't know how to open this address, because the protocol (rmation.chm) isn't associated with any program."  Can anyone advise me on how to proceed?

[RoboColum_n_]

Can we clarify a few things first.

It sounds like you have migrated the RHX3 output into the RoboHelp HTML application and are not using the old RoboHelp for Word application at all. Is that correct?

Second you start talking about WebHelp generating OK and then say the problem is with a CHM. Do you mean that you are creating both WebHelp and CHMs and that the generated WebHelp is all displaying OK?

Next I am confused what Firefox has to do with CHM files. Do you get this error message when you double click on the CHM file to open it?

[Guest]

My apologies for being such a noob with Robohelp:

• I imported the existing RoboHelp project by opening the .hpj file in the project. There's also a .HLP in the directory; however, when I try to open that file, I'm consistently getting "The specified file could not be opened.  Ensure that the help file is not running and try again." It's not running.
• I'm not using the old RoboHelp for Word application at all.
• Once I opened the old project, I immediately generated web help using the File/Generate/Primary Layout(WebHelp) menu option. I'm not intentionally doing anything to generate CHMs.
• If I open the top-level generated .htm file in Firefox, I see a left-side navigation bar with the table of contents.  The index is fully populated; however, clicking on many of the TOC entries leads to the error I posted above.
• There are no .CHM files in the generated WebHelp content (which is what I expected and hoped for)
• I found a bunch of references in the generated HTML that look like this:
    <nobr><a href="../n.chm::/V_I_P_Definition.htm"><b>V.I.P. - Definition</b></a></nobr><br>
  I have no idea where "n.chm::" came from.  It's not in the generated folder structure.
• The TOC entries have similar incorrect links with portions of .chm filenames and double-colons.

[Peter Grainge]

Somewhere along the line someone has created those links that now need to point the correct topic in the webhelp. I am assuming the topic is part of this webhelp.

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See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Guest]

Yes, the VIP definition is part of the help project.  I'll speak with the person responsible for maintaining the help but I suspect that she's not very technical.

[Peter Grainge]

Useful to know you are not the author. When you create links, it is done in a different way when creating links between topics in the same help file and topics in another help file. The latter is also done in different ways according to whether you care linking to a topic in a CHM and a topic in say webhelp.

I believe this is where your problem lays.

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See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Guest]

I met with the person responsible for maintaining the help content.  There doesn't seem to be anything different about the links that function properly as opposed to those that end up corrupted.  It seems as if most of the TOC entries (maintained manually), all of the index entries (also maintained manually), and half or more of the inter-topic links are bad.

[Peter Grainge]

Can you please post a good link alongside a bad link?

Did the RoboHelp for Word project generate webhelp or CHMs?

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See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Guest]

The RoboHelp for Word X3 project was used to produce WinHlp (.hlp files) only.

A good link looks like:

<a href="Essential_Comment_Guest_Lookup.htm">Essential Comment/Guest Lookup</a>

A bad link (from the same generated .htm file) looks like:

<a href="-à¡­.chm::/Guest_Lookup.htm">Guest Lookup</a>

[Guest]

New information. I found that if I change some of the "upgrade options," I get much better results. Specifically, when I first open the old .hpj file, I selected the following options:

• In "Import WinHelp Project: Folders": select "Do not create subfolder" under "Folder for HTML Files"
• In "Import WinHelp Project: Features": select "Retain" under "External Topics"

All the links come into the upgraded project correctly.  I'm wondering how I might have known about these option settings at the beginning of this effort.

I appear now to have a functionally-equivalent web-based help system.  It would have been nice if the glossary in the old system were imported into RH10 as a collection of glossary items but I'm not sure how the links to those items that are currently in the help topics ought to have been handled in that situation.

[Peter Grainge]

The two links do show one was created as a link to another topic within the project and the other to a topic in a CHM. Can you identify in the new project one of the links that was broken and see how it is written now.

There is something on my site in Snippets about converting from WinHelp but you have fixed the issue now.

Importing from WinHelp is always a trial and error process.

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See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Guest]

I understand what you are saying about the links having been created differently but there is no apparent difference when I examine the link properties in RH4W.  Also, I don't think that there are any .CHMs to link to in that project.  Why would changing the two options I selected convert an external link to a .CHM into an internal topic link?

The Adobe documentation of the "convert from WinHelp" process is seriously lacking.

[Peter Grainge]

So those links above are post import?

If yes, what were they before import?

Just curious.

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See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Guest]

(Sorry for the delay in getting back to you - I don't seem to get email notifications of updates to this topic despite "watching" it and having my profile setup to request email updates. Yet another frustration.)

In the RH4Wx3 project, they're both just a normal links to hekp topics, all in the same Word file (the links and the link targets).  I tried to generate WebHelp out of RH4W but it fails without much explanation, so I can't cut-and-paste a link to show you.

I realized that when you wrote "Importing from WinHelp is always a trial and error process," you were implying that the documentation for that process is useless.  I have to agree.

Does Adobe offer support of any kind for RoboHelp?

[Peter Grainge]

Sorry for the delay in getting back to you - I don't seem to get email notifications of updates to this topic despite "watching" it and having my profile setup to request email updates. Yet another frustration

See the sidebar on the right. There is a link to start email notifications.

In the RH4Wx3 project, they're both just a normal links to hekp topics, all in the same Word file (the links and the link targets).  I tried to generate WebHelp out of RH4W but it fails without much explanation, so I can't cut-and-paste a link to show you.

Are you generating to a local drive? Otherwise I am not sure why that is happening.

I realized that when you wrote "Importing from WinHelp is always a trial and error process," you were implying that the documentation for that process is useless.  I have to agree.

No that isn't what I meant. It is more that different projects seem to work better one way than another.

Does Adobe offer support of any kind for RoboHelp?

Paid support is available. The number depends on your location. If US based, it is

800-833-6687

Monday-Friday, 5am-7pm PST

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See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Guest]

Sorry for the delay in getting back to you - I don't seem to get email notifications of updates to this topic despite "watching" it and having my profile setup to request email updates. Yet another frustration

See the sidebar on the right. There is a link to start email notifications.

It says "Stop email notifications."  There are no emails in my spam folder.  I'll try a different email address.

In the RH4Wx3 project, they're both just a normal links to hekp topics, all in the same Word file (the links and the link targets).  I tried to generate WebHelp out of RH4W but it fails without much explanation, so I can't cut-and-paste a link to show you.

Are you generating to a local drive? Otherwise I am not sure why that is happening.

I was.

I realized that when you wrote "Importing from WinHelp is always a trial and error process," you were implying that the documentation for that process is useless.  I have to agree.

No that isn't what I meant. It is more that different projects seem to work better one way than another.

If there's no documentation describing why different projects work differently, how to tell how a particular project will work best, and what the relationship is between a bad outcome and a specific, incorrectly set option parameter, I'll stand by my characterization.

Does Adobe offer support of any kind for RoboHelp?

Paid support is available. The number depends on your location. If US based, it is

800-833-6687

Monday-Friday, 5am-7pm PST

Thanks, I am US-based.

[georgedemo]

I had the same problem importing an RH for Word project into RH11.

Almost every link in the project was corrupted - both links in TOC and within topics. The TOC links were all showing as external links, not regular page links.

The corrupted links all started with a couple of garbage characters, then "n.chm::" followed by the actual link text.

By trial and error, I found that the same options Steven used worked for my project. That is:

• In "Import WinHelp Project: Folders": select "Do not create subfolder" under "Folder for HTML Files"
• In "Import WinHelp Project: Features": select "Retain" under "External Topics"

Once I set those options, all the links were fine.