Files missing in Project Manager pod

Report · Mar 17, 2011

Yesterday, I installed RH8 HTML on my new Win 7 computer. I then copied over from my old Win XP machine all my files related to a specific help project. When I use Windows Explorer to review a list of all the .htm files I've copied over, they all are there. However, when I open the project in RH8 on my new computer and view a list of the .htm files that are in a particular folder in the Project Manager pod, some of the .htm files are missing. Curiously, if I open the TOC for the project and click a topic that references one of the "missing" files, RH8 opens the file and I can edit it in the usual way. That indicates to me that the file really is where it is supposed to be and RH8 can find it. Nonetheless, the filename is missing from the Project Manager pod. What's more, when I want to insert a hyperlink, the filename is missing from the list of .htm files to which I can link. This is a problem, obviously.

I should note that RH on my old computer is version 8.0.1.204 and RH on my new computer is 8.0.0.203. Hard to believe that would be the issue, but thought I should mention it. Also, the files that are missing have similar names to files that are not. For example, reportCheckDataMailmerge is missing but reportCheckDataMailmergeSee is not.

I would be grateful for any suggested fixes.

Report · Mar 18, 2011

See Opening Projects on my site.

You should install both patches before opening projects in RoboHelp 8 and that is certainly the cause of your problems.

Apply both patches and then open a backup of the project. Otherwise you will have a lot of repair work because of not applying the patches first.

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

Help others by clicking Correct Answer if the question is answered. Found the answer elsewhere? Share it here. "Upvote" is for useful posts.

Report · Mar 18, 2011

Thank you for the advice and the quick response. I've applied the two patches, 8.0.1 first, 8.0.2 second, to RH on my Win 7 machine and now opened a backup copy of my project. To my disappointment, files are still missing from the Project Manager pod. I've tried opening restored backup copies of my project a couple times just to be sure I was opening clean files that have been previously touched only in 8.0.0. No luck.

After reading the description of the issues these patches are designed to fix, like you I was pretty confident that the patches would be the answer. Any additional suggestions?

Report · Mar 18, 2011

A backup that was worked on in 8 without the patches?

Are you seeing anything in broken links?

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

Help others by clicking Correct Answer if the question is answered. Found the answer elsewhere? Share it here. "Upvote" is for useful posts.

Report · Mar 22, 2011

It turns out that my issue is that files in the Project Manager pod and in the pick list for assigning a hyperlink target are being sorted by Topic Title rather than by File Name, which is what I'm used to. In most cases (but not all) the Topic Title and File Name in my project differ, so I was looking for the File Name in one part of the list, but the topic was listed by Topic Title in another part of the list.

Which begs the question: is there a way to dictate to RoboHelp which text to sort by, Topic Title or File Name? I'm also wondering whether this change is intentional or a bug? The tool tip for the button that sorts the files in the Project Manager says "Sort by Name" after all.