Robohelp 7 App is really slow in deploying files to the remote server - Why?

[Uma_S]

Hi,

I am totally new to RoboHelp. So Please forgive my ignorance!

The Robohelp we have was developed by somebody who is not with our company anymore. I think he used Robohelp 5 to develop our Policies and Procedures. The files are deployed on one of our remote server. (Do the server have to have Robohelp installed as well?? I checked the server to find if it has Robohelp installed and I could not find it?)

One of our Analyst has Robohelp on her PC. She used to have Robohelp 5 and now she has Robohelp 7 to deploy the files to the server.

It was working perfectly fine till she used Robohelp 5. Deploying the files to the server took about 2 hours before and now with Robohelp 7 on her PC, it takes forever and we are unable to deploy the files to the server from RoboHelp application!

What should I be doing to make it faster? Please let me know. Thanks in advance!!

Uma

[Captiv8r]

Hi there and welcome to our community

Sorry, but there is an unequal distribution of Questions VS Answers here. In other words, there are far more questions to be answered by you before we can try to help you solve the issue.

For starters, RoboHelp always runs locally on the authoring PC. The process is that the help author creates and edits the files, then generates an output. This is very similar to working in a kitchen. You mix ingredients, then bake cookies, cupcakes, muffins or a cake. With RoboHelp, you mix the ingredients (Images, HTML Topics, etc) and bake the outputs (WebHelp, FlashHelp, AIRHelp, etc)

So we first need to know where your kitchen is. Is the person authoring on a computer independently working with RoboHelp where all ingredients are in the local kitchen? Or is the RoboHelp project storing the ingredients at the grocery store? What I mean by that is that the project elements should be inside your local kitchen. If the RoboHelp project is on a network server, it's very much like trying to keep the ingredients in the grocery store. It won't work so well.

So when the generation process occurs, where are the output files ending up? Again, these should be on the local hard drive. Not the server. Many folks try to eliminate the publishing step by generating directly to the server. Bad move.

Or, are you using the built in Publishing function? And if so, what are the settings that are in effect for governing the publishing?

The bottom line here is that you have basically walked into the service department of a car dealership and announced that your car is running slow and you want to know why.

So the technicians are looking at you rather quizically and asking:

Did you put the right fuel in?

When was the last maintenance?

How many miles are on it?

How old is the fuel that you put in it?

Things of that nature...

Cheers... Rick

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[Uma_S]

Hi Rick,

Thank you so much for the quick response. To answer your questions,

Our Analyst independently works off her PC and all the files are currently located on her local drive. she is the only author that edits , creates and generates outputs (Webhelp)

She is not using the built-in publishing feature.

Our output files are being sent to a web server which is located in a different location. (so all the server needs to run those files is just the webservice and not the Robo help installed??)

Please let me know if you need more information.

We really appreciate your help. Thank you!

Uma

[Captiv8r]

Hi again

Okay, so far so good.

Working locally - Check

Not using the built in publishing feature - Ding! This raises a question. How exactly are the files ending up on the server?

Indeed the server needs nothing related to RoboHelp to serve the files. You just copy the entire content of the WebHelp folder to the server and you should be good to go.

Cheers... Rick

Helpful and Handy Links RoboHelp Wish Form/Bug Reporting Form Begin learning RoboHelp HTML 7 or 8 moments from now - $24.95! Adobe Certified RoboHelp HTML Training SorcererStone Blog RoboHelp eBooks

[Uma_S]

Hi Rick,

Thank you!! Was on vacation and could not respond to you right away.

I am not sure if it uses the internal publishing feature. But the wizard where we specify the "Destination location" is "Webhelp general" wizard that is available under the "Generating Webhelp" section of the below link.

http://www.helpstuff.com/hc_200010.html

Please let us know if we need to use some other wizard to make it faster. Thank you!

Uma

[Captiv8r]

Hello again

Well, ummm, how shall I put this? YIKES! The page you linked to is for RoboHelp 9. Now you may be scratching your head at this point and saying waitadoggoneminnute there MR. Man!What gives?

Here's the deal. Way way back when a little company called eHelp corporation held the reigns, RoboHelp was at version 7. Then version 8 came along but wasn't really called version 8. It was called version 2000 because it was released in the year 2000. Then they published version 9. Then came version 10 and that one was called version 2002. Then version 11 shipped but was called X3. Then version 12 shipped and was called X4 and finally "lucky" version 13 arrived and was called X5. Enter another small company known as Adobe. Adobe saw the 5 and decided to name their next version "6".

This wouldn't really be much of a problem, EXCEPT, we now see material that is grossly outdated that would seem to apply to today's versions and of course they are wrong!

So here's where it gets fun. Note that the date of the article you pointed to is October, 2000. Nearly ten years old! I'm guessing that the dialogs you are seeing are a wee bit different than what are on that page.

So just to be complete:

When you double-click the WebHelp layout you see the first of several dialogs. It usually looks like this:

Note the highlighted part. This is the location where WebHelp will generate to as well as the name of the Start Page. Oftentimes folks configure this location to be the location where everyone points to open the WebHelp from the connected PCs. And if this is the case, that is likely the reason the process is so slow.

The location specified here should always point only to the C drive.

If you click the Next > button three times you should see the screen below.

THIS is where you would want to configure the publishing destination.

So you should have two actions. One action creates the files and the second action Publishes (or copies) the files from the C drive to the server.

Note that none of the options have been enabled in the dialog above. That's typically the preferred way to work. You only need to enable these options under specific conditions. So if you have this configured but have enabled perhaps the Republish all option, perhaps that would also explain the slow operation.

Hopefully this helps... Rick

Helpful and Handy Links RoboHelp Wish Form/Bug Reporting Form Begin learning RoboHelp HTML 7 or 8 moments from now - $24.95! Adobe Certified RoboHelp HTML Training SorcererStone Blog RoboHelp eBooks

[Uma_S]

Hi Rick,

Thank you so much!! Just wanted to let you know that you are really helpful to us.

We have followed the steps you have provided. It was way faster This is what we wanted! Thank you!

One concern though - When we publish to the server, all the files are getting copied over successfully (fastly). But the folders are not getting copied over and we are getting the below error message. Our analyst who is trying to publish the files on the server is given Admin access on the server. Any thoguhts? Please let us know. Thank you!

Uma

[Peter Grainge]

That is covered in Snippets on my site.

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Captiv8r]

Hi there

Specifically, Peter is referring to Snippet number 55 I believe. And the snippets are found at the link below:

http://www.grainge.org/pages/snippets/snippets.htm

However, before you create new folders you might try examining the folders that are there to see if you have any files inside that are named thumbs.db.

These are files that Windows creates in order to more rapidly present information when you are viewing the folder using thumbnails view. The files are usually bearing system attributes and because of this it can cause publishing to fail in the manner you are describing. Even if they are present, you may not actually see them inside the folder. Again, this is because they have that system attribute I described earlier. You have to configure your Windows Explorer to show you the system files. (Windows is often like an overprotective parent and hides many things from you).

Cheers... Rick

Helpful and Handy Links RoboHelp Wish Form/Bug Reporting Form Begin learning RoboHelp HTML 7 or 8 moments from now - $24.95! Adobe Certified RoboHelp HTML Training SorcererStone Blog RoboHelp eBooks

[Uma_S]

Hi Rick,

Thank you so much!! It worked.

Out analyst had the "Republish All" option checked before. She tried unchecking all the options as you suggested in your previous reply. It works great now.

Thank you for all your effort.