Bad .cpd file and broken links in RH 9...

[Joe@Majiq]

Ok, I've seen many posts on this, but nothing that solves my issue.

When I open my project, RoboHelp becomes VERY slow. I can do things, but not at a pace that is anywhere near acceptable. Eventually, it stops working at all.

If I delete the .cpd file, the project opens and is responsive like it should be, but MANY of the links are broken and some of the topics are gone. This project has almost a thousand topics, and fixing each and every link is a rather daunting task.

This project is an update from RoboHelp 4 or 5.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

[Joe@Majiq]

I should clarify that the upgrade what done a while back and that everything was working fine in RH 9 until today.

Also, if I check the Clear Project Cache option in General Options, I get the same result as if I deleted the .cpd file myself.

[Captiv8r]

Hi there

Can you please click File > Rename Project so you see the dialog and screen capture that? Post the image here in the forums for us to see.

Cheers... Rick

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[Joe@Majiq]

Here's the first one...

And the second...

Thanks!

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Your first image looks like something to do with source control. Are you running some sort of source control?

[Joe@Majiq]

I did source control for another project, but not this one. Also, it was another coworker that found the problem, and she doesn't have any source controlled projects on her machine. She's never even touched a source controlled project on her machine. The whole project was done locally on her machine. When she ran into this problem, she copied the project to a shared drive, and then I copied it to my machine.

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Try copying it again by zipping it up and transferring the zip file. Extract it to your c:\projects\\ folder

[Captiv8r]

Hi all

@Jeff - Personally, my own suspicions are that the project is a WebHelp Pro or FlashHelp Pro project. Either that, or WebHelp Pro or FlashHelp Pro is configured as the primary layout.

@Joe - Is the RoboHelp Server in use here? If so, WebHelp Pro or FlashHelp Pro are appropriate layouts. If you have no clue what RoboHelp Server is, you have fallen prey to a common misunderstanding with RoboHelp users in choosing the "Pro" layouts in a misguided interpretation that makes you believe that "Pro" is somehow better than WebHelp or FlashHelp. In fact, it's just a different layout type intended for use with the RoboHelp Server project.

Cheers... Rick

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[Joe@Majiq]

@Rick,

We're not using RoboHelp Server. Never have. On the flip side, my coworker has been generating WebHelp Pro. I'm not sure why, but that's what she said. But would generating WebHelp Pro cause these problems? Would generatinging WebHelp (not Pro) stop this from happening?

My coworker reverted to a backup from a couple of days ago, but after getting back to where she was before things went haywire, things went haywire again (fortunately she had a more recent backup this time and didn't lose much work). She's trying to determin if it's a specific topic that is causing the problem. I'll let you guys know.

@Jeff, The project was originally a WebWorks project with the source files in FrameMaker. When the new project was created, my coworker imported the FrameMaker files, not the WebWorks files.

[Joe@Majiq]

I'll give that a try, but my coworker is busy this morning and won't be able to zip it until this afternoon. I'm not sure what difference this will make since she has the exact same symptoms on her machine and her project has always been local (she never copied it to the server and then copied it back).

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

You probably want to start with a copy of the backed up pre-RH9 project (that worked, presumably) and go through the upgrade process and see what's happening. I assume that this issue started when she upgraded the project?

[Joe@Majiq]

I was incorrect... My coworker created the project from a bunch of old FrameMaker files. She imported the old files one topic at a time, cleaned them up, and then imported the next topic. This worked fine for several months.

Two other things she says might be relevant: :  1) the project lost its master page, 2) one of the last things I did the last time I worked on the project was edit the style sheet to remove some superfluous styles.

[Captiv8r]

Hi Joe

I suspect your coworker fell into the "Pro" trap. What I mean by this is that many users that don't know RoboHelp very well will often examine the different output types available and make a beeline straight for the "Pro" outputs in the misguided belief that because they end in "Pro", they are simply the best or the "Ultimate" type of project. It would be like seeing a vehicle labeled as a "Professional" version and believing that because it was labeled as such, it would have many features that others didn't. And certainly that's the case, but the thing is, the vehicle doesn't have passenger tires and instead has metal wheels for driving on train tracks. In other words, it is a specialized use vehicle intended for specific conditions and working within a specific framework.

The same goes for the "Pro" outputs. These outputs have special coding that allows them to work well with the other Adobe component called RoboHelp Server. And that component allows some special things such as keeping track of hits on topics, reporting on searches that failed and what was searched. Things like that. The bottom line here is that either of the "Pro" outputs aren't intended to be used with generic web servers. So you may as well switch back to standard WebHelp or FlashHelp.

However, having said that, I'm not convinced it's really related to the broken links issue or the corrupt CPD issue. I do suppose there is a very slight possiblity it could play a role because sometimes really bizarre things happen, but I'd be surprised if that was the cause.

I was sort of expecting to see that your project was stored on a network drive. But the dialogs reveal a different story. The only thing I might suggest would be to create a folder named Projects right off the root of your C drive. ( C:\Projects ) and place each project inside its own folder there. In your case it would appear to be: ( C:\Projects\EoW )

Something else to consider is file and folder names. Consider anything other than A-Z, a-z, underscore ( _ ) or 0-9 to be a special character. Those can cause problems.

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

[Joe@Majiq]

Does anyone know why all the links are broken when we use the Clear Project Cache option? It really seems weird to me that our project is dependant on a file that can be auto generated.

[Peter Grainge]

This is the only thread where I have seen this reported and the CPD is now really just a cache for when you are working on the project.

First I see you have the project in the Desktop folder. Try moving it to something like C:\MyProject.

Second, if that doesn't make any difference how exactly are you creating the links?

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Guest]

<<This is the only thread where I have seen this reported>>

Hello all,

I wanted to reply and say that I have been having the exact same problem as the OP with my RoboHelp project. The slowness/unresponsiveness started in RoboHelp 8 for me. Some background: I first started working in RoboHelp X5, and I upgraded from X5 to 8 in 2010. I have approx. 1600 topics in the project, with numerous images, links, .PDFs, and so on. We use Microsoft HTML Help as the file output and the .CHM file is approximately 20MB, so it's a large project. Upgrading several releases, you are always going to have a few hiccups, but it wasn't anything unmanagable and the project wasn't slow. I have always worked on the project on my local C:\ drive. When I first upgraded to 8, I was not on the latest release (8.0.2), and I thought my enlarged .CPD file was to blame for the slowness I was experiencing with RH8, as this KB article explains:

http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/528/cpsid_52862.html

I installed the patch, but in the process I also deleted the .CPD file, regenerated it, and the project resumed its normal speed but it broke a lot of topic links. Once I fixed all of the broken links (which took forever), I assumed the problem was resolved with this patch.

This year (about a month ago), I upgraded from 8.0.2 to 9.0.2. I didn't have any problems converting the project from 8 to 9, and no slowness. A new tech writer has joined the team and will be working on the project from now on. I put the project files on a network drive (momentarily) for the tech writer to download locally; the new tech writer copied the files to her local drive and opened the project from her local C:\ drive. No problems. A month passes, she has made a fair number of edits, and all of a sudden she is experiencing slowness to the point where the project is almost unusable, the exact same problem I was having pre-8.0.2 patch. I checked the .CPD file and it is twice the size it was one month ago when I first gave her the project. I suspect that this, once again, is the cause of the slowness. I am about to tell her to delete the .CPD and reopen the project (I am aware that there is a setting under Tools > Options in RH9 that will always delete/regenerate the file when you open a project -- she did not have this checked, and it may be a good idea to have that checked in the future) but I am afraid that deleting and regenerating the .CPD will create numerous broken topic links yet again.

It would be great to have a solid resolution to this issue, because it is an annoying little problem to keep running into! Any advice or help would be appreciated.

Thanks!

--Jessica

:edit:

I had the tech writer select the option under Tools > Options to always regenerate the .CPD -- closing and reopening the project seems to have fixed the slowness, and no topic links broke when the .CPD regenerated (there were a few broken links, but they were there previously). So far, so good, I suppose. Hopefully this option to always regenerate the .CPD will fix the slowless permanently, although to me, this seems to be a legitimate bug in the software that is still causing problems.

[Peter Grainge]

The way the CPD grows is not a bug. The CPD file is a Microsoft Access database and that growth is in the nature of the beast. Users of Access know to compact the database when required. With RoboHelp rather than compact the file, the solution is to simply delete it and let it rebuild. The deletion can be manual or through the option that Adobe have given you.

What problem is being caused? From what you say, none unless you don't set the delete cache option.

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Guest]

<<What problem is being caused? From what you say, none unless you don't set the delete cache option.>>

Hello,

You are correct. If the .CPD file grows too large and is not regenerated -- in RH8 or RH9 -- the entire RoboHelp project slows to a crawl, evidenced by the mouse constantly flickering. The flickering mouse makes it extremely difficult to do any work within the project -- it is difficult to open files, edit topics, or even type in the WYSIWYG editor. Regenerating the .CPD file tends to resolve the slow performance -- at least for us -- but regenerating this file has caused numerous broken topic links in the past, specifically with RH8, even after patch 8.0.2. was applied. When the file grew too large in RH9 and slowed the project to a crawl, you can imagine my hesistancy to regenerate the .CPD file due to my past experience with broken topic links. Thankfully, regenerating the .CPD did not break any topic links in our project like I was fearing it would.

I assumed this problem was isolated to RH8 only, and I was surprised to still see this slow performance/CPD file problem continue in RH9.

--Jessica

[Joe@Majiq]

Just an update. My colleague says that she hasn't seen the problem in the last couple of months. She makes a backup of the project before she compiles it and she doesn't use multi-file Find and Replace All.

[Peter Grainge]

There was a specific performance problem in 8 that was fixed in a patch.

A bloated CPD can result in performance issues with any version, it is a Microsoft Access database and they require compacting from time to time. With RoboHelp it is easier to simply trash the file and let it rebuild.

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Joe@Majiq]

Peter, most of the time it probably is easier trash the CPD file and let RoboHelp rebuild it. But when that breaks 90% of the links, then it's not so easy. I just wish there was an easy way to repair the links.

Anyway, the performance issue is like a switch being flipped. One minute everything is fine, and then the next minute the CPU pegs out at 100% (and doesn't let up).

Very frustrating.