Why does the Contents pane of my WebHelp output not display when I 'view result' in IE

[Rtrown]

I have RoboHelp 9. For the past few weeks, when I generate my WebHelp outputs and choose 'View result', the locally compiled output shows a blank Contents pane when viewed in my default browser, Internet Explorer 11. However, I can successfully view locally in Chrome or Firefox, and, when published, the contents pane views fine online.

I have other issues that may or may not be related. I have recently had to rebuild two separate projects, because one dropped many of the baggage files, whilst another dropped all but two of the images. I had to go back and re-import the lot in each case.

When this first happened, I wondered if the project was corrupted, and I tried a technique I picked up a while ago, involving removing the xpj and cpd files from Windows Explorer, and attempting to restore from the *.FPJ file. However, I get a message saying 'This file is not an HPJ file. Please select an HPJ file to open'. The project does not have an HPJ file! So I had to rebuild the project.

[Willam_van_Weelden]

If you are using RoboHelp 9, I would be very surprised if you could view help locally with Chrome, as Chrome does not support that. Are you sure you are on RH9?

Also, make sure that you have installed the latest patches and any missing fixes for WebHelp. (See RoboHelp Patches and Updates | WvanWeelden.eu for an overview.)

But is this really a problem since it does work on a server?

Kind regards,

Willam

[Rtrown]

Hi William

Thanks for your response. The version is 9.0.2.271. I felt sure I had viewed in Chrome, by right-clicking on the Primary Layout in the SSL pod and choosing 'View with...', but I can't get it it to work now, although Firefox works okay. In the great scheme of things that's not a deal-breaker, as you say, but the fact that the project I just re-imported all the images into has just dropped them again is more than a tad irritating.

Thanks for the updates tip, I will check that.

Ruth

[Peter Grainge]

@Willam I am wondering if the first problem has not been properly described. When viewing generated help if you right click and select View Source, as you know, you will get the HTML for the tripane window. I think Rtrown wants to see the code for the default topic. If so, that is something like View this frame.

Turning to the last paragraph, there is also some confusion there.

When this first happened, I wondered if the project was corrupted, and I tried a technique I picked up a while ago, involving removing the xpj and cpd files from Windows Explorer, and attempting to restore from the *.FPJ file. However, I get a message saying 'This file is not an HPJ file. Please select an HPJ file to open'. The project does not have an HPJ file! So I had to rebuild the project.

First, you should only delete the CPD file in most scenarios. See Opening Projects on my site. Deleting the XPJ should not be done other than in a few situations. Secondly, you then restore from the HHP file, not the FPJ file. Not sure how you would do that. Finally an HPJ file is related to RoboHelp for Word and is its equivalent of the XPJ file in RoboHelp HTML.

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See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Rtrown]

Hi Peter

Thanks also for responding. As I said to William, the viewing of the Contents pane is not vital, just annoying - but I wondered if it shed any light on the other problems.

I am sorry that I didn't accurately describe my steps to try and restore the project, assuming it was corrupted. As you suggest, it was the HHP file I tried to open, and it was then that I got the message which said 'This file is not an HPJ file. Please select an HPJ file to open'. I have never worked in RoboHelp for Word, so am confused by why it should suggest this. When I 'OK' this message, the subsequent message says ' 'The file.......,hhp could not be edited. Please make sure the file exists and it is accessible'. Have you come across this before?

Ruth

[Peter Grainge]

If you go to File > Open, the File Type dialog has a dropdown with a number of options. I can only think that somehow you had that set to open an HPJ file, when of course pointing it to an HHP file would cause Rh to whinge.

Run through the process again with a copy of your rebuilt project and you should see what I mean and be ablve to replicate the steps you describe.

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See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[Rtrown]

Thanks Peter - have now been able to open the project from the HHP file with your help.

It didn't have all the images and baggage files present (although some), so I have started to rebuild it. As I re-link baggage files, they are not appearing in the project, so I am adding them one by one to rhbag.apj - then when I save, they appear in Project Manager. It doesn't see like there's a long-hand way to ensure the project continues to recognise the images though, am I right?

[Guest]

We have seen what appears to be a compatibility issue with RoboHelp 9 and IE 11. Our desktop support team rolled out IE 11 without telling anyone. When I generated WebHelp locally, the output in IE was blank. I refreshed the page and could see the TOC pane and the topic page. Each time I would click a new topic in the TOC, the IE page would initially be blank until refreshing. The issue was not present in Firefox. We do not use server, so I don't know whether this was or was not an issue there. Desktop support rolled us back to IE 9 to address the issue in the interim. We are upgrading to RoboHelp 11 soon and I expect re-upgrading to IE 11 will follow shortly thereafter.

[Rtrown]

Thanks Tennickly. We have no immediate plans to upgrade RH, so perhaps we'll try rolling back IE.

[Captiv8r]

Not to nag, but just to note that RoboHelp updates generally contain code that causes it to continue working with new browser versions that appear.

Cheers... Rick

[Guest]

Our desktop guy pushed IE 11 out without testing it thoroughly and we saw some issues. He retested it and made some adjustments, I guess, because it works now with RH 11 Responsive HTML output. I wish I could get some information from him on what he changed, but he is too busy texting.