Changes to paragraph formats aren't affecting anything at all

Report · Sep 20, 2011

Hello:

The recent post by Dennis ("phiguru"?) touched on my problem, but mine is simpler.

I foolishly changed an entire topic's text to red to remind myself that wholesale content revisions are needed, and that the old "boilerplate" is not for publication. (I was in a hurry and have since remembered Conditional tags, of course. Duh.)

Now, I am trying to restore the affected paragraph formats back to their original font colors. (Fortunately, my dopey first color change seems not to have affected the same paragraph formats in other topics.)

These images looked terrible when I first posted this a moment ago, thank goodness clicking on them opens a larger, clearer version!

Using the pencil-icon Edit tool in the Styles and Formatting pod, I'm simply trying to change the color of the font. Seems pretty straightforward, but just in case:

The line "Tiled Texture Mapping..." is one of the Heading 3 culprits that refuses to change. I change the color to Black, turn on Underlining, hit OK and, get Nothing.

I don't expect anything really 20th-century to happen, like the change being applied universally, but when typing on a new blank line that has been designated Heading 3, the new text is still red.

Going to an existing reddened Heading 3 line, and re-selecting the desired style from the Apply Style dropdown at top left only gets me that same maddening business cited by Dennis:

Do you want to:

1. Update the shyle to reflect recent changes?

2. Reapply the formatting of the style to the selection?

Any advice, anyone? I know I'm probably missing something obvious, but it continues to escape me, and time, life and my work queue are marching ever-forward.

Thanks.

Report · Sep 20, 2011

Hi Lew

Have you tried right clicking in the line that is colored and choosing "Remove Attribute"?

Cheers... Rick

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Report · Sep 20, 2011

Hi, Rick:

I seem to have gotten it finally by changing the color in the Styles dialog, Format button (at lower left) > Font dropdown selection, instead of relying on the formatting controls right under the Paragraph Preview in the Styles dialog. I don’t know why RH takes the former more seriously than the latter.

Then, clicking “Reapply the formatting of the style to the selection?” in the Update/Reapply Style dialog instead of “Update the style to reflect recent changes?” seemed to really nail it down.

Now mind you, I’m not a complete bonehead. I did originally think that “recent changes” referred specifically to changes made wholesale, on the fly and with insufficient forethought, as with my ill-considered changing of all the text to red as a mnemonic device.

But then when I was trying to change things back “the right way”, I started to think that “recent changes” referred to recent ‘proper’ changes in the Styles and Formatting facility, especially since “Reapply the formatting of the style to the selection?” initially seemed so useless.

I did glance at ‘Remove Attribute’ but when it didn’t seem to hold the promise of immediate complete self-actualization and instantaneous transport to a land of dancing unicorns, infinite free energy and no starvation, I lost interest and moved on in my search for fixes.

I think I’ll try your suggestion first next time.

Thanks.

Lew Yedwab

Senior Technical Writer | Chyron

5 Hub Drive | Melville | NY | 11747

w +1 631 845 3869 |

Skype: yeswab

chyron.com<http://chyron.com>

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Report · Sep 20, 2011

Hi,

It's not RoboHelp, but the css rules that are to blame. Inline styling takes precedence over styling from your style sheet. The font dropdown adds inline styling in the style attribute of the HTML tag.

Best practice: stay away from inline styles. What if you've diligently made all your page names and button names blue only to find that your page names should be red instead? No easy search and replace. When you use only css styles, ten seconds of editing your css and your whole project is reformatted.

Greet,

Willam

Report · Sep 21, 2011

Thanks William. I was trying to avoid disturbing the .CSS, but I knew it to be possible that this is the only really correct way.