RH9 - Can not create ANY links in linked Word documents ;-(

[wasatech]

Ok, this does not make sense:

- From RH9, create a fresh empty project

- Create two word files "Topic1.docx" and "Topic2.docx"

- Put "Link Here" in each document

- Save the documents

- From Project Manager, Project Files, link both documents, generate, update all, etc.

- Now create hyperlinks in each topic, pointing to the other topic using default topic editor in RH9

- Save All and Generate the WebHelp project and test the links are there and work.

- Now open and edit both word documents in word. Add some text to each and save

- In RH9 Project Manager, Project files, Update All and open the topics in RH9 default editor

Walla, the full text is there, the LINKS are gone. Actually, I understand that this is how it works, but the BIG problem is that links to bookmarks, other topics, links to outside resources created in RH9 Default Editor cannot be preserved when the related/linked document is edited in Word. AND, you cannot create ANY of these links in the Word documents. So, you have a help system that has really nice update features when an author makes a change to a document, but NO LINKS. Updating a linked document will DELETE ANY changes made within the RH9 Default Editor.

Does this make any sense? Has my brain fallen down? Is there another workflow option?

Thanks for any help

Lyle

Hummmmm, NO POPUPs, mini TOCs or See Also Keywords, Link Controls, etc. etc. etc.

[Peter Grainge]

As long as I am understanding you correctly, it makes perfect sense.

Update is causing the topics to update to whatever is in the Word documents at the time. The links are not in the Word documents, only in the RoboHelp topics created so they get trashed. The idea of linking is to have your project generate help based on the content of the Word document at the time you generate.

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[wasatech]

Peter. Thanks for responding, but I still am at Issue with this.

The (does not make sense) part is:

- Say I spend 10 hours creating links to topics or bookmarks within topic content that was generated from linked Word document(s), and publish the help site.

- Now, one of my Authors, working on help content outside of RoboHelp, comes along and adds a "!" in the document(s).

- I now, working within RoboHelp, need to update the document(s) that were edited.

- Boom. There goes my 10 hours of link setup and adds another 10 hours to do it again.

Again, the core issue here is that you cannot created Hyperlinks in Word documents that translate to RoboHelp topics when importing or linking to RoboHelp projects.

Lyle

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

"Again, the core issue here is that you cannot created Hyperlinks in Word documents that translate to RoboHelp topics when importing or linking to RoboHelp projects."

- I didn't see any evidence of that it your earlier post. Maybe I missed something? Since I don't use Word for my source material in my RH projects, I can't say that this statement of yours is true or not. I DO know that when I author in FrameMaker and make links between docs and sections within docs, that those links (known as cross-references in FM) DO get translated into my RH topics when I use the Technical Communication Suite.

[wasatech]

I guess I need FrameMaker?

I guess the core problem that I am trying to define is that it looks like I cannot author topics with cross references (links) in Word, like you can in FrameMaker.

Unless there IS a way to create cross references in Word?

Lyle

[Peter Grainge · Accepted solution]

I understand what you are saying but it is the way it is. Linking is intended to display the content of a Word document as it is in Word. It is not intended that you undertake processing as you describe for precisely the reason you state, it will get overwritten with every update.

The idea is that someone central updates the document and you just sync to the new version. The text you are using to create the link might not be in the updated document, what is RoboHelp supposed to do then?

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[wasatech]

Thanks again everyone.

Looks like the answer is that I cannot create a help system with cross references using the linked Word document process, unless I feel like manually recreating the cross references everytime a linked Word document is updated.

Will take a look at FrameMaker.

Lyle

[Peter Grainge]

I don't need cross document links in Word but they can be created. Have you tried that? I wouldn't like to say they will survive in RoboHelp but isn't that the thing to try?

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[wasatech]

Found this and will try:

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/word-help/create-a-cross-reference-HP005189376.aspx

Lyle

[Peter Grainge]

In the conversion settings the is a check box to convert references to hyperlinks. I don't know if it is relevant but it's worth a try.

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[wasatech]

Yep, the convert references to hyperlinks setting seems like it should work. Have not been able to get it to work yet, but the documentation says it should??

http://help.adobe.com/en_US/robohelp/robohtml/WS0EFF88A0-6406-4175-A5C3-C5633D01D0C3.html#WS15871F7D...

tcssup is looking at it

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Ok, my curiosity was killing me - I had to try this for myself. I created 2 Word docs and put a few Heading1's in them (to see if it would paginate correctly), and a hyperlink in one just to the second doc, and one from the second back to a bookmark in the first doc. Then I created a new RH9 project and linked both Word docs to it. I edited the Conversion settings like the help says and then did an update all. Both docs paginated correctly & the plain hyperlink to the second doc worked fine. The hyperlink to a bookmark location, however, didn't come over correctly. It appeared to (nice blue underline, hypertext indicator in the topic), but when you look at the underlying HTML, the

tag for it was empty. So no link. Not sure why that was so. I had a look at the location of the bookmark in the first doc's topic, but it doesn't show up. That may be the issue (the failure of Word bookmarks to come across).

[wasatech]

did the hyperlink in document 1 to document 2 open the word doc, or go to the topic created from the linked word doc?

I am trying to go from a reference  like "see also", to a topic or bookmark of my choice in the same topic, or another.

I did find that there is supposed to be a limitation on the convert references to hyperlinks function, that you can only reference to items in the same word document, like to a figure, or a bookmark, etc.

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Yes, it's trying to open the Word doc - something definitely messed up in here ;>)

I think I'll stick my FM to RH workflow.

[RoboAsh]

I have been observing this thread and wanted to just chip in to remove some misnomers,

1. If you create any hyperlink from any MS Word document (say Doc1) to another MS Word document (say Doc2) and you import the original document (Doc1) then it brings its reference (that is the word document Doc2) as baggage in the RoboHelp project and the hyperlink is not created to the html file generated for the word document Doc2 (linked or imported seprately).

     thus if you click the hyperlink in RoboHelp it should open the word document Doc 2 (that was brought into the project as baggage)

2. If word "conversion setting" alone are modified (like the settings “convert references to hyperlinks”) then at times the mapping fails to work, in such scenarios just go to the conversion settings dialog of FrameMaker and modify multiple “other settings” (it won’t impact your word conversion mapping.) Now any conversion settings applied for word will work.

            Hence the “convert references to hyperlinks” is working but you need to update any FrameMaker conversion settings to get it working

@ Lyle – as now the flow must be clearer so I would give you a suggestion to merge all the word documents that you want to work with and use cross-references to places you want to have hyperlinks and use the option to “convert references to hyperlinks” in RoboHelp.and keep all the authoring in word document so that nothing is lost on update.

NB – There is a method to create intra document cross references in MS Word

In FrameMaker the concept of book gives it a sense of collection and thus cross references across FM documents inside a book are converted easily but in Word there is no way to group word documents and thus it is not possible to convert any spatial hyperlinks from one document to another.

Hope this helps

Ashish

[wasatech]

Just heard back from tech support. The convert references to hyperlinks feature does not work.

Bummer

[imagineimage1]

Hey Peter.. sort of a related question here using RH 10 at yet another new job... here's the deal

Bookmarks in the Word source file.

Aren't these supposed to get into RH when you link the doc?  I see hidden bookmarks are available, but the normal bookmarks aren't coming over. I deleted the Word hidden bookmarks and they disappeared from the updated linked doc afterwords, but creating the bookmarks in Word and hoping they show up as bookmarks in RH doesn't work; I don't want to modify the doc in RH because I want the MS Word doc to be the master version.

Message was edited by Peter Grainge Email address removed.Email addresses should not be included in posts to any forum as they can be harvested by spammers.

[Peter Grainge]

I suspect you need to check your settings. See the Importing and Linking Word Documents pages on my site.

Please see the note I have added you your post re including email addresses.

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[imagineimage1]

looks like it may be a bug

[Peter Grainge]

The rest of this thread is about links between topics / documents surviving the trip to RoboHelp. As I understand it from your direct email you want the bookmarks to create a TOC in Rh where there is no TOC in the Word document, just the bookmarks. You are saying this is broken in Rh10.

I have never tried to create TOC in Rh that way but I will see what happens when I get a moment to set up a test. Meantime, can anyone confirm they have created a TOC in Rh from a Word document that has no TOC but does have bookmarks?

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Guest]

Actually a little clarification is needed maybe:

In RH 9, I linked a Word doc that had H1 level headings.  Upon linking it into RH, EACH of those H1 headings became a RH topic by itself.

The Word doc did NOT ever have a TOC; in fact I never do this.  I always create a RH TOC based on topic titles as just about Im sure everyone does; drag and drop and so on.

The bookmarks in the Word doc appeared in the Project Manager list under the title of the imported Word file.

Now, mind you, I may be completely wrong about this and may be referring to an IMPORTED word file, not a linked Word file, but regardless, I think in RH v9 the behavior was the same; the bookmarks in the Word file came over and showed up in the RH interface.

In RH10, RH output being Webhelp Pro just so you know the end result, this behavior is not being seen AT ALL until a TOC is created in the MS Word doc (which is linked).  But making a Word TOC just to get the bookmarks (that is, the H1, H2, H3 levels and so on) seems like a not needed feature because I want the RH TOC to be that TOC; there is no reason to have two TOCs; one on the left and one in the body of the topic on the right.

So you see, my thinking is this is a bug or tweak Adobe must have thought we needed or something in RH 10. 

So you see, what I want is those bookmarks to come over, but not because I create a TOC in the Word doc to get them, to show up in the Project Manager list under the Topic title.

[Peter Grainge]

I'll read through this in the morning but the only change to linking and

importing in Rh10 was automapping.

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

I still didn't see any evidence of you trying to create hyperlinks between 2 Word docs that both get sucked into a RH project (either by linking or importing) that didn't preserve the links between the 2 (or more, due to pagination) now RH topics. Have you actually tried that? What happens to the hyperlink references in the resulting RH topics? I'm only asking because I have no experience with trying anything like this.

[wasatech]

Yes, I have tried creating a new blank project and 2 new word files with hyperlinks to each other, created in word.

When I link the Word files and generate the project, the links are there, but open the linked to Word document, not the Topic created from the Word document in the linking process

Maybe I am not creating the link properly to go to a bookmark in another Word doc or something?.