Newbie - Linking to a specific topic

[dobbleman]

Hello,

I just got RoboHelp 7 today and a bit lost. Here is my issue. I'm an App Dev Project manager. I came onto a project that has an application that links to a RoboHelp project. All links within the application send the user to the default.htm. Which is nice because you have the search tool and the left side navigation pane. However, inside of our application we have help links that appear to be very specific to a topic, yet when you click on the link you get the default page. We can create links right to a specific htm page from our application, but when we do that we only get the topic and none of the nice features that Robo help adds, like the navigation pane. What I'd like to do, is create a link that takes a user to the help files with the appearance that you get when you go to the default page, but instead of sending them to the default page, send them to a specific help file.

Can anyone get me pointed in the right direction? Should we use bookmarks in Robohelp? If so, how do we link to them.

Thank you so much (in advance)!

[Guest]

well hello to you too!!!!

what's up?

[dobbleman]

Hi, sorry I hit submit to quick, I just updated the question. If you can help, I would greatly appreciate it!

[dobbleman]

Would I use Map Ids? Bookmarks?

[dobbleman]

It seems that Map Ids is a bit more robust than I need. I just need to have a url link to a specific html page within the help project, while maintaining the same look/feel as we get by going to the default site.

Should I be looking at hotspots?

[dobbleman · Accepted solution]

Thank you all so much for the assistance.

The answer to my problem, in case anyone comes across this in the future, can be found here;

http://www.grainge.org/pages/authoring/calling_webhelp/calling_webhelp.htm

[mitchgrrt-7v0oDZ]

The article here

http://www.grainge.org/pages/authoring/calling_webhelp/using_urls.htm

is all in terms of webhelp. Would the same method of using URLs also work for flashhelp? Thanks.

[Peter Grainge]

Yes but not down to bookmark level.

[mitchgrrt-7v0oDZ]

This isn't working for me. The URL of the base help page is:

file:///C:/makana/kahuna/help/Motivator/!SSL!/WebHelp/Motivator.htm

and in trying to follow the instructions in the web article, I changed it to:

file:///C:/makana/kahuna/help/Motivator/!SSL!/WebHelp/Motivator.htm?#path/Alignment_Best_Practices.htm

where Alignment_Best_Practices.htm is one of the other pages in the !SSL!/WebHelp folder. This makes a File Not Found error. Am I doing something wrong? Thanks.

[Peter Grainge]

Try with just the # symbol and not the query as well.

Also in the browser go File | Open and point to the start page. Copy the address to a text file and close the browser, or just that tab.

Add the CSH stuff to the link in the text file and then paste it back into the browser.

[mitchgrrt-7v0oDZ]

quote:

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Try with just the # symbol and not the query as well.

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That worked. Thanks a lot for the help.

What's the difference between the URLs with ?# and ??# and just #
Is there a time we should be using one versus the other?

By the way in response to my earlier question on this thread, it does seem like the bookmarks also work for flashhelp, once I got the URL syntax right.

Thanks again.

[Peter Grainge]

I believe the reason our developer used those different symbol combinations was because a second CSH call when the first was still open did not work if the same symbol was used.

Just # is the normal. Only use the others if necessary.