HTML, Printed, Webhelp size too large

[tlmossman]

We have generated our Microsoft HTML Help, Printed DOcumentation and Webhelp. These files are too large for us to place them out on our webpage. Is there any way that these files can be reduced? Currently the html is 188MB, and we need it at 4MB

[Peter Grainge]

Your webpage has links to the webhelp so I am not clear about the problem, there is no overhead in a link. Are you saying the total webhelp is 188mb? That is hardly an issue surely, that would fit on a memory stick and all the user should be doing from a webpage is calling one help topic. Perhaps you mean each page is that size? What sort of content? Text, graphics?

HTML help (CHM) is meant to go on the users PC rather than a server.

Can you explain a bit more.

[tlmossman]

Sorry Peter, I was not very specific.

Our HTML help size is 93.1 MB, I am told that it has to be 4MB in order to fit on our server to be placed out on our "extranet" in order for our customers to download and view. We had it this size last month, this month I added hyperlinks to each topic that links to our server that brings up a captivate tutorial on the section. I also added about 6 more topics and images-- I do not think this should have made the project go from 4 to 93.1! So I'm not sure if there is some way I can compress the files. Are there formatting issues that I am not seeing that is causing this?

Our Printed Document is 5.83MB

Our WebHelp is 97.1 MB

I was hoping there was a way I can compress these files, in order to make them smaller. I feel like what I added this month should not have made the file get that much larger.

I'm not sure if this helps anymore than the previous post.

[Peter Grainge]

Have you looked at the file size of the images? Links and some text should not make any significant difference. Have you ticked the Optimize setting when generating the CHM?

[tlmossman]

I did select the Optimize setting when generating the CHM.

Can you explain how i can check the file size of the images? and Condense them if that is the problem.
THanks!

[RoboColum_n_]

Can I chip in here? You say you added a captivate tutorial. Does this sit inside the help project or are you just linking to it? If the former, this could explain the increase. Peter's suggestion about file sizes could also be the problem. If you right click on the images you added in the Images folder and select Properties you'll be able to see the file size. Have you tried experimenting with different file formats for your images? What file type are you using?

[tlmossman]

We have it linked.. I did not have it sit inside the help project.

Our file types are .jpg's

[RoboColum_n_]

Have you the project on a network drive? If so, move it off to a PC hard drive. Also, look at the project's source files. Is there any file there that is large? Have you a backup you can compare against? May help find the offending article?

[tlmossman]

Our project is currently on our network. I will move that to my pc hard drive. We do have a backup from last months, so i will need to compare each file to the other one? Or is there a faster way in doing that. Thanks for your help!

[RoboColum_n_]

OK. RH and networks just do not sit well. You can work for ages with no problem and then wham! I bet if you make the same changes to your backup version - with it sat on your PC's hard drive - your problems will disappear. As far as the file sizes are concerned, you only have to see if there are any large file sizes that weren't there before. If you sort your project's files by size in Windows Explorer you'll see.

[tlmossman]

Problem w/ last months was that it had some major issues, we started editing the html, with word-- and from this board realized that was a big mistake, so we had to rebuild the entire robohelp project, with importing some files in. So i'm not sure where I went wrong with that to cause the large issue size.

Thanks for your help

[RoboColum_n_]

The problem is likely to be caused by running the project on a network.

[Peter Grainge]

Sorry, I have just come back to this. I think what we are identifying here is that you ran the project on a network and that screwed it up. You then rebuilt it using Word so while that fixed the corruption, it then bloated your HTML.

There are topics on my site about importing and maybe redoing that to get cleaner HTML, or just cleaning it up manually will help.

To confirm it is Word that has bloated things, yes compare the current project with your backup.