Upgrading from a (very) old version of RoboHelp ...

[Nicky58]

Hello there,

I'm the only author in our company (Nottingham, England) and I've happily been using RoboHelp x5 for the last few years. We generally only build CHMs and RoboHelp has proved to be an excellent, robust product. We're now looking to upgrade and I see that Adobe RoboHelp 2015 is available. Would anyone know if I could upgrade all our RoboHelp x5 projects to Adobe RoboHelp 2015?

Thanks,

Nicky

[Peter Grainge]

Yes RoboHelp 2015 will upgrade your project. The only issue might be lists if you have any. When RoboHelp 8 was introduced it caused some issues that are explained on my site.

Whilst X5 is an old version, so is the CHM format (last updated by Microsoft in 2004) and that seems to be all you require. The question has to be what you hope to gain?

One immediate advantage would be that you could output to WebHelp which is more graphical and then use a supplied script that easily converts that to CHM format. That would give you better looking CHMs.

If you foresee needing to output other formats such as responsive HTML that adapts the layout to the device on which it is being viewed, then an upgrade would be worthwhile. If that is not urgent, then maybe wait for the next version of RoboHelp?

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See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring information

@petergrainge

[Nicky58]

Thanks for that Peter. It’s a valid point, why spend £1000 if you don’t have to?

One of our oustomers has asked for something other than a chm. I’ve created Webhelp output which seems to run ok in IE and Firefox but will not run at all in Chrome. And there’s always the niggling thought at the back of your mind – am I having problems because our software is so old?

RoboHelp x5 just feels limited and, well, old, and it would be nice to have a look at what the latest RoboHelp has to offer.

Regards,

Nicky

[Peter Grainge · Accepted solution]

The big problem with old versions is browser compability and that is why

you are having problems. Looks like it is time to upgrade.

Might be worth going to a responsive HTML5 layout though rather than

Webhelp. It's where things are going and where the focus is for new features.

Contact me via my site for a bit more information.