Robohelp 10 changed my winhelp font & corrupted the topic jumps/links

[MicroWriter]

We  just upgraded to Robohelp 10 because robohelp 7 was not compatible with word 2010

We had been using Robohelp 7 for word to make our winhelp file for our software, with linked topics from the software controls.

Now I discovered we can't make winhelp with robohelp 10!

So I am trying to switch our software help to html help instead- I made an html help system some years ago and it ran in a console/window and

the look was similar to winhelp in some ways, so it should be familiar while we get used to html help- I thought.

HOWEVER- several problems- after importing the hpj project:

1. the font has changed from Ariel to Times new roman

2. 95% of the help jumps have been corrupted now that they are hyperlinks!

3. A possible problem- I wonder if the software control topic id links will work when we compile it and try it!

4. punctuation like quotation marks and hyphens have been changed to box symbols!

I do not know what css means so I chose the "inline formatting" option when importing the hpj.

I have been spending hours manually selecting all text in each page  and changing font,  then finding where each link should point to, then changing the link text colour to green so it matches the way our old help is.

I tried finding where the styles list was and changed the hyperlink style colour to green but that only worked for the one page i was on, not any other page.

If this was Word it would change the whole document  at once.

It is very time consuming and will likely take months.  Essentially I feel like I must remake the entire help project from scratch! Re-writing all the text and adding links. God only knows if the topic ids will link to our software controls either.  Surely an expensive piece of software like this should automate everything???  While using robohelp 7 for word it all worked quite smoothly.

Is there a way to globally change all pages to Ariel again?

Is there a way to fix the hyperlinks??  When I hover the mouse over one of the links it pops up a small yelow box to the right, showing the link target.  Almost every one has a strange sequence that almost sounds like a recognised topic  page but not quite.

Also, we had some words that were underlined with a dashed line to indicate a popup description of a term. I cannot see how to add a dashed line in robohelp 10; it seems like it's a solid underline link or nothing.

When I try the "View"option  and click on one of these popup links it simply opens a new window- it doesn't pop it up in a small window like the old one.

(I did select the option while editing the link to be a popup.)

Robohelp also has corrupted the quotation marks and hyphens in the text on the pages so they appear as box symbols.  More manual work to do!!

Any way to import again and fix these problems???

When I tried generating a microsoft html help file, just to see what it will look like, the result looked like a boring white web page, not a neat help console like the old one I made a few years ago just using Microsoft's html help program. There was only one single window- no left pane with topics list or tabs for index or contents etc and no neat border frame.

Is this all Robohelp 10 can do for all that money???

CD

[Captiv8r]

Hi there

Often, we look at things and conclude they are utterly hopeless when in fact the problems are trivial.

MicroWriter wrote:

We  just upgraded to Robohelp 10 because robohelp 7 was not compatible with word 2010

Fair enough. Indeed you must upgrade if you need to ensure parity with Microsoft Word.

We had been using Robohelp 7 for word to make our winhelp file for our software, with linked topics from the software controls.

Now I discovered we can't make winhelp with robohelp 10!

Actually, that's misleading. Sounds like when you installed RoboHelp, you didn't opt for also installing RoboHelp for Word. That's now an optional installation you must specifically choose. Only RoboHelp for Word will allow creating WinHelp.

So I am trying to switch our software help to html help instead- I made an html help system some years ago and it ran in a console/window and

the look was similar to winhelp in some ways, so it should be familiar while we get used to html help- I thought.

I would heartily encourage anyone to consider making the move to HTML based Help.

HOWEVER- several problems- after importing the hpj project:

1. the font has changed from Ariel to Times new roman

2. 95% of the help jumps have been corrupted now that they are hyperlinks!

3. A possible problem- I wonder if the software control topic id links will work when we compile it and try it!

4. punctuation like quotation marks and hyphens have been changed to box symbols!

The font issue is generally easily corrected by properly using CSS.

Unsure what to advise about the help jumps. Can you be more explicit about what you mean when you say they "have been corrupted"? What does that mean? Does it mean you can't read them? They simply don't work?

You list a pondering as a question in number 3.

Certain characters aren't recognized sometimes in the world of HTML. That likely explains what's going on with the symbols.

I do not know what css means so I chose the "inline formatting" option when importing the hpj.

Ouch. Definitely would recommend starting over and using the CSS option. What CSS does is sometimes covered in a two and three day class on JUST CSS. But it doesn't really mean it's hard to learn. Just that it's sometimes complex. But using CSS, you define rules for how certain elements are formatted. In the world of HTML, you have Headings. (H1, H2, H3...) so you create rules that say "for H1 (Heading 1) use this font, at this size and in this color. CSS works like that.

I have been spending hours manually selecting all text in each page  and changing font,  then finding where each link should point to, then changing the link text colour to green so it matches the way our old help is.

I tried finding where the styles list was and changed the hyperlink style colour to green but that only worked for the one page i was on, not any other page.

If this was Word it would change the whole document  at once.

Once you get your mind wrapped around the way CSS works, it gets much simpler. The problems you are seeing are likely the result of using the inline formatting option during the import. Inline formatting is directly painting across the text. It remains that way regardless of any CSS rules that advise how things are formatted. So while this looks awful, it's really a simple thing and should be simple to fix.

It is very time consuming and will likely take months.  Essentially I feel like I must remake the entire help project from scratch! Re-writing all the text and adding links. God only knows if the topic ids will link to our software controls either.  Surely an expensive piece of software like this should automate everything???  While using robohelp 7 for word it al worked quite smoothly.

Is there a way to globally change all pages to Ariel again?

Again, most of this is related to CSS. So let's focus on simple things first. Take things in stages. For now, I'd again recommend doing the import again but using the CSS option. That should help. Focus on the linking of controls and whatnot as a separate process once you get your mind wrapped around the visual differences.

Is there a way to fix the hyperlinks??  When I hover the mouse over one of the links it pops up a small yelow box to the right, showing the link target.  Almost every one has a strange sequence that almost sounds like a recognised topic  page but not quite.

The hyperlinks should also be tackled in a different phase. You need to sort what happens during the import. In WinHelp, you can have multiple .DOC/.RTF files involved. Did you have more than one file in your older project? If so, possibly RoboHelp didn't realize the additional file(s) need to be included. Just speculating on that bit though. It's been a long long time since I touched WinHelp and RoboHelp for Word.

Also, we had some words that were underlined with a dashed line to indicate a popup description of a term. I cannot see how to add a dashed line in robohelp 10; it seems like it's a solid underline link or nothing.

When I try the "View"option  and click on one of these popup links it simply opens a new window- it doesn't pop it up in a small window like the old one.

(I did select the option while editing the link to be a popup.)

Robohelp also has corrupted the quotation marks and hyphens in the text on the pages so they appear as box symbols.  More manual work to do!!

Any way to import again and fix these problems???

When I tried generating a microsoft html help file, just to see what it will look like, the result looked like a boring white web page, not a neat help console like the old one I made a few years ago just using Microsoft's html help program. There was only one single window- no left pane with topics list ro tabs for index or contents etc and no neat border frame.

Is this all Robohelp 10 can do for all that money???

CD

I think all these are just "growing pains" you are experiencing. You have been working with older technology and have quite literally been transported to a future place and time where you must now learn and adapt to the new ways of working. Again, once you learn what's going on and become comfortable with the tool and the way it works, you will likely find yourself much happier.

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

[MicroWriter]

Thanks Rick,

Lots of helpful information there. I will look for tha toption to install robohelp for word because if that enables me to maintain th winhelp right now it will lift a lot of load from me. I can work on the html help  changeover in the meantime.   I left the installer to run in my absence so maybe the option for robohelp for word came up and timed out and continued. When i got back to work two weeks  later it had completed the install

I will try an import again using the CSS option (or were there two CSS options?)

It sounds like the CSS allows either global or sub page formatting- sort of hierarchy of styles- is that right??

An example of a link that does work is this....

This text pops up to the right of the screen when I hover over a link:    Hyperlink [GCS_Settings_Payload_Button_Type.html]

ctrl + click works.

However, this is one that does not work....   Hyperlink [s-Payload-Button-Type.chm::/IDH_100022.html]  then to the right of the closing

bracket is an elongated rectangle symbol.    (I can't type it here)

It looks like the first part of the title is missing; it was probably like the above title that works.

nothing  happens when I ctrl+click it.

When I search for the correct topic & find it, the "link to" box shows   ..\MP2000Help\IDH_100022.htm

By the way, when I right-click on one of the bad links and choose to edit the Hyperlink, the current (bad) link is alway in a folder named "Remote URLs"

In the project list of Robohelp 10 there is a folder named "URLs" and all the files in there have bad/corrupted names.

Example: -"rectangles"-.chm::/aglSwitchAlt.htm

That doesn't look the same after pasting (the actual name has lots of vertically narrow rectangles in it but I substituted them for the text " rectangles" because they stopped this page from sending!).

There are about  120 files in the original Winhelp project   consisting of .doc and .rtf, .hh, .prs, rbh, xls, akw, .cnt, .GID,.err, .hlp. hpr, hpj, hpt, kkw,  qwm, trk.

Chris

[Peter Grainge]

RoboHelp for Word was not a popup option that you missed. When you install, early in the process RoboHelp appears on the left with an empty pane on the right. If you highlight RoboHelp on the left, you will see the options and RoboHelp for Word is one of them.

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[MicroWriter]

Peter, thank you --  I have found that option now. My mistake of course, I started the install and it took longer to get going than I thought, so I had to leave for holidays and let it run.  Not being familiar with Adobe's plan for the install, it seemed like all the software was automatically going to be installed anyway unless I changed something; I had no idea there was any optional software hidden, so I just clicked next and left.

I now find that I can continue working with winhelp day to day and even generate  HTML help to see what it looks like.

Meanwhile I can learn the new HTML help design tools.

[MicroWriter]

Success!  Once I had Robohelp for Word v10 installed, I found a much easier way to change to HTML help is to use the Robohelp for word v10 to open my old winhelp project, then generate Microsoft HTML help from this, deselecting the option for "only compile chm file". This then generated all the html files and CSS files for a whole html project.

I was able to open THIS project in Robohelp html v10-- Bingo!!

Using this method all the text is the correct font, as in the original hpj project and all the links are intact; some links already have the original green colour we are used to. The rest --- for some I found that changing the hyperlink style colour to green changed several topic pages while for others I had to alter the Hyperlink colour separately.

All in all a huge leap into the 21st century. Mind you I still haven't tried the software topic links from F1- will do that tomorrow.

Thanks again to Rick and Peter for being encouraging and helpful when I was at an all time low!