Unable to Import a DitaMap into RoboHelp 8

[777rclark]

Windows 7 Home Premium/64-bit Operating System.

Technical Communication Suite installed.

RoboHelp patches 8.0.1 and 8.0.2 have been installed, DITA-OT 1.5.1 installed/tested, and Enviroment Variables have been set.

When I try to import a DitaMap, Robohelp stalls on "Importing".

Anyone have any ideas???

Thanks so much!

[Guest]

I get the same problem.

I looked at the topic in framemaker forums,  http://forums.adobe.com/message/3231136#323113 and was hopeful: somebody got RH to import a ditamap by running RH as a dminsitrator, but I have tried that. I have set all my environment variables. I can run the 'ant test  all ..' command line and that works fine

[777rclark]

Hi -

Make sure you have:

1. Installed DITA OT (1.4.2.1)
2. DO NOT set any extra Enviromental Variables (as in the DITA OT instructions)
3. Run RH as Administrator
4. Point to DITA folder in RH settings when importing Map

Hope this helps.

Best Regards,

Rebecca

[Guest]

Hi Rebecca

It all works now!

I should have guessed: don't use the current software, disregard the instructions, run Robohelp in a special mode....

Heartfelt thanks and best regards,

Peter

[cdybdahl]

I am having a similar problem.

Windows 7 Enterprise, 32 bit.

RH 8.0.2.208

Fresh DITA-OT 1.4.2.1 (have tried multiple versions)

Previously, I successfully imported numerous DITA maps into RH8 and generated several different types of output. Nice feature, I thought.

Now, however, when I try to create a new project by importing a DITA map, I get the following error:

The "<path to file that does not exist>.HHK" file is not a valid HTML Help Project file.

Ok, so I create a new empty project, and then try to import the map from File > Import > DITA Map, which yields the following error:

Error occurred while importing <path to ditamap>. See Output View for details.

And the output view reads:

Processing with DITA Open Toolkit failed. No Logs found.

Check DITA Open Toolkit is installed and working.

The latest JDK is installed, and I am able to build output using the toolkit from the command line, but the error message implies that Robohelp is unable to kick off the toolkit build. I am running RH as administrator.

We're supposed to be using RH as a publishing tool on a project for which we have a rapidly approaching deadline. Any and all assistance is appreciated.

[777rclark]

Hi -

Curious that it was working before but not now... what has changed?

Have you set any extra Envirmental Variables for DITA OT output?  If so, then you will be unable to generate RH output.

[cdybdahl]

Thank you for the response!

The only thing I can think of that changed between my original proof of concept testing in November and last week is that several Windows updates have been installed.

Further complicating matters, I just got a new laptop last week Friday. First thing I did was install RH8 and tried to import several different maps with identical results. I tried MANY different versions of the toolkit, including the one that ships with XMetaL (I believe 1.4.2) that worked for me in the past.

Since then, I set all environment variables as suggested by the instructions in the DITA-OT 1.4.2.1 installation guide. This also gives the same result (which is to say, no result). It's no problem rolling back those changes, since they didn't help at all.

So, your Windows 7 installation is completely up-to-date with all of the latest patches? And the import DITA map feature is working for you? It really looks to me like RH is unable to kick off the OT process at all, since the import fails just about instantly. Keeping an eye on running processes while attempting to import a map, and I'm not seeing any JVM activity at all.

I'm close to shelling out the $39 for a support call -- I just wonder how well this feature is likely to be supported by whoever I get on the call.

[cdybdahl]

In the interest of eliminating variables, I have just finished uninstalling all Windows updates from my system.

I also set all environment variables back to normal.

Running RH8 as administrator, I still get the same errors as mentioned above.

I also tried downloading a trial version of RH9, but the DITA map import facility looks more or less unchanged from 8, and resulted in the same error.

I have been able to replicate this issue on another machine on my enterprise domain,running Windows XP, as well.

For fun, I am going to try installing a trial on my home machine tonight and importing a DITA map there. I suppose it is possible that there is some sort of group policy being enforced here that I am unaware of and that is impacting this process somehow.

[Captiv8r]

Hi there

Totally revealing my ignorance of DITA here. Why would it be important to import a DITAMap? What would it do?

Keep in mind that what I know about DITA is very limited. I know it's an acronym that represents the Darwinian Information Typing Architecture (I think) and that it has something to do with structuring documents. And unless you work for NASA, GM, FORD or other, you likely don't need it.

Cheers... Rick

Helpful and Handy Links RoboHelp Wish Form/Bug Reporting Form Begin learning RoboHelp HTML 7, 8 or 9 within the day! Adobe Certified RoboHelp HTML Training SorcerStone Blog RoboHelp eBooks

[cdybdahl]

Well, this question is really a bit outside the scope of a support forum, but there are many reasons one might want to use DITA, and it is not useful only to the types of organizations you mention.

DITA is really a strategy for tagging content semantically by type (hence the T in DITA). It allows authors to tag information acording to what that information IS, rather than what the information should look like. DITA also provides several very nice re-use mechanisms and allows for conditional publishing in ways that HTML markup does not allow. DITA content lends itself to being stored and indexed in an enterprise repository and capturing a robust set of metadata. DITA also positions your content for localization in a way that HTML authoring does not.

As for why I want to import my DITA content into RoboHelp, I am tasked with transforming our DITA content into several different deliverable types. Of these, I have a specific need to replicate the look and feel of a legacy help system maintained in RoboHelp 6 (which contains thousands of topics, and is not really a candidate for conversion at this time). I could spend my time reverse-engineering the generic RoboHelp WebHelp output. But RoboHelp offers a very nice (when it works) utility to import this content to a RoboHelp project and then produce the WebHelp in exactly the format I need.

So really, RoboHelp is a publishing platform for me.

As a Community Professional, are you an Adobe employee (not sure how these forums work)? If so, is there any way you could call the attention of one expert in these matters to this question?

[Captiv8r]

Hello again

LOL, no, I'm not an employee. Only a user same as you.

I'm not asking why one would use DITA. I totally understand it's a question beyond the scope of a support forum. But I feel asking why you would use something like a DITA Map it in conjunction with a standard RoboHelp project is valid. No?

What I understand about DITA is that for the vast majority of RoboHelp users it is overkill. I do understand that it allows you to tag information. But I'm really struggling to understand how it would actually help or work inside a basic RoboHelp project. With RoboHelp, you simply edit topics. The content is inside each topic unless you opt to use one of the RoboHelp features such as Snippets or Variables to populate content from a central location. I'm thinking a DITA Map has to be combined in some other way to be useful. So I was wondering what else was involved.

In pondering how it might work, I fathom that a DITA Map would allow some sort of marriage to occur where you had specific content that was somehow tagged in RoboHelp (Conditional Build Tags perhaps?) so that maybe you could create some bizarre XML output that you would later process into some other format. Is that how it works? (when it does, of course)

So it would appear that you are maybe pulling content from some other repository that is DITA based into RoboHelp? So you need the DITA Map so RoboHelp understands the content?

Cheers... Rick

Helpful and Handy Links RoboHelp Wish Form/Bug Reporting Form Begin learning RoboHelp HTML 7, 8 or 9 within the day! Adobe Certified RoboHelp HTML Training SorcerStone Blog RoboHelp eBooks

[cdybdahl]

Rick,

Oh, ok. I misunderstood.

I am not using DITA "with" or "inside" of a RoboHelp project. Not really.

All I want to do is publish my DITA content using RoboHelp as a publishing tool.

It's completely a one-way trip: all authoring is done using a specialized XML editor. A DITA map is sort of like the "TOC" construct I see in RoboHelp. It just arranges your topics into a deliverable. And I agree completely. As long as you know your content is only useful in the context of what RoboHelp can produce, then DITA is overkill. The value comes when other groups in the enterprise can use or even contribute content without being tied to a proprietary authoring tool.

And it does not come pain-free.

Chad

[johndaigle]

Hi.

Rick, maybe you could move this thread over to the FrameMaker  integration forum where folks with DITA issues would most likely  congregate.

http://forums.adobe.com/community/robohelp/robohelp_framemaker

cdybdahl, to answer your question, we Adobe Community Professionals here are all volunteers and not employed by Adobe. What we know about DITA is very limited. This is because we "came up" as RoboHelp authors and not from the FrameMaker side where structured Frame excels at DITA. As an instructor, I have set up and demonstrated the DITAmap import workflow successfully several times. So I know it works (Heck, if *I* can do it...)  In my case, I did have to make some changes to the JRE/JDK(?) environment variables and I think I changed to DITA OT (1.4.2.1). After that, it was fine.

I was hoping the "Run as Administrator" would do the trick because that's what seemed to work in the thread on the FrameMaker forum which Peter Branham suggested. http://forums.adobe.com/message/3231136#323113

The "gurus" in this DITA workflow are generally FrameMaker practioners, so folks like Scott Prentice (saprentice) are your best bet. Also, there is a new Technical Communication Suite evangelist for Adobe named, Tom Aldous. He's extremely knowledgeable on the XML and DITA workflows.

You might take a look at this new blog and perhaps post a query to him. http://tmaldous.com/

I've tried to reach out to some folks on your behalf, but not much luck. It seems everybody is either preparing for or in transit to the big WritersUA shindig in Long Beach this weekend and next week. In fact, my colleagues Rick Stone, Peter Grainge and myself will be there, too!

I apologize we are coming up empty. We'll keep trying.

Thanks for your patience.

John Daigle
Adobe Certified RoboHelp and Captivate Instructor
Evergreen, Colorado
www.showmethedemo.com

[cdybdahl]

Thanks for your reply, John.

The hell of it is, I know it works too. I had it up and running as a proof on concept fairly recently. Trying to isolate what changed on my system between then and now has been... less than entertaining.

I've seen conflicting information about changing the environment variables. I didn't have to do any of that previously. Both leaving them alone and adjusting them according to the instructions in the toolkit's installation guide yields the same results at the moment.

I'm setting my home PC up with a trial of RH8 to see if I can get it working here, but that's realy just going to introduce more variables into the equation.

Thanks for your thoughts and for pointing me in some other directions. This little problem has got me pretty well stumped.

Chad

[cdybdahl]

One more thing, then:

I just successfully imported a DITA map (the same one that was giving me trouble on my work PC) into RH8 on my home PC.

It required no special setup whatsoever:

1. Install RH8 trial.

2. Download DITA-OT 1.4.2.1 and unzip it to C:.

3. In RH, click New > Import tab > DITA Map > select map > click Next > point RH to C:\DITA-OT.

That is all. No setting environment variables. No running as administrator.

Weird.

This leaves what I thought to be the most remote possibility as now the most likely one: there must be some group policy on my coprorate domain preventing RoboHelp from kicking off the DITA-OT build (the process always failed more or less immdediately).

I really wish this was not the case, but it is what it is. Glad it's not a tool problem, I guess.

Thanks to all who replied. I'll post my findings in the event there are any to post.

Chad

[Peter Grainge]

As an aside, if your work licence is only installed on one PC there, you are allowed to use it on a home PC for your own use. It cannot be used by a second user.

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[cdybdahl]

That's actually really good to know, Peter, thank you.

The source of this problem seems like it's going to be difficult to isolate in the near-term, and the use of the home PC appears likely to be part of the workflow for at least a little while.

Thanks again to all.

[Guest]

I found another glitch when I came back to import of ditamap and found it didn't work.

The cause was that I couldn't import one of the files topicref'ed in the ditamap, and in that topic, I found a conref which included this file reference:

../../../../folder1/folder2/folder3/conrefs_file.dita

I changed the file reference to:

../conrefs_file.dita

And the import worked fine!

Pete

[cdybdahl]

I was actually able to resolve the issue working with my support people. It turned out to be a problem with a group policy -- I didn't press as to what policy was causing the problem, but removing my PC from the group fixed things up for me.

[joelcw]

Having the same issue with both RH 8 and 9. Since no diagnostics are reported, I'm likely to jury-rig the topic import, TOC, and index from my Ant build.

Using DITA-OT1.5.3 and RH 9.

I'm willing to exchange tips with any others who are using a mixed DITA/RH environment.

As for the benefits of going to this extra effort, I figure the link management  benefits of DITA's reltable are sufficient to justify the work.

- Joel

[RoboAsh]

Hi Joel,

           Can you please answer few questions like

1. what is the origin of Ditamap (how was it created ) any chance it was created through FrameMaker?

2. what flavour and version of product are you using (like RoboHelp 8 or RoboHelp 9 non TCS or you Tech. com. suite. on your machine - if Yes then which version)

3. One thing to cross check are you able to directly generate output from OTK and it is not giving any error - Ideally if it Ditamap compiles fine with OTK (is error free) then it works fine with RoboHelp.

4. Have you installed and are using RoboHelp through admin priveleges.

Regards

Ashish

[Gale_James]

My old laptop is runs TCS 3.5 and DITA Open Toolkit and everything works fine. I got a new laptop Windows 7, installed the TCS 3.5 suite, and DITA Open Toolkit.  I get the following error message:

Processing with DITA Open Toolkit failed. No Logs found.

Check DITA Open Toolkit is installed and working.

I talked to IT about changing my group policy. They are unwilling to change the group policy or remove me from the group policy for one software suite. If the group policy was changed on my machine, the original group policy would automatically be restored on a nightly-basis. If the problem is a group policy issue, I need a different solution.

Regards,

Gale