Server vs Standalone

[Guest]

Comparing the standalone RoboHelp product with RoboHelp Server 7 for published WebHelp with Internet access:

Does using the server version result in a better end user experience based on (1) how quickly pages are served and (2) how quickly the user can navigate through the Contents and individual pages?

If yes, why? What is different between the published files created by the standalone vs server product and how they are served?

My assumption would be that the end user experience is determined solely by factors such as whether you are using a dedicated server and the resources allocated to the server.

I know that RoboHelp Server 7 has the advantage of allowing multiple developers to work collaboratively on projects, that is simplifies publishing to a server, and that it provides surveys and reports. But my question here is whether the end user experience is different--assuming both sets of WebHelp files are running on a dedicated server? If so, why?

[Peter Grainge]

Welcome to the forum

Sorry you are not getting much of a response. I suspect most people use WebHelp or WebHelp Pro but not both, hence the difficulty in comparing them.

I don't think you will find any discernible difference in response speeds. Pro offers favourites and the ability to search Word documents and PDFs as well as the content. You can get that by using ZoomSearch as described on my site for a lot less money. Pro gives you feedback.

RoboHelp Server is nothing to do with multiple authoring. That is part of RoboSourceControl and they are two different things.

Originally RoboHelp Server was also required to deliver merged webhelp but from X3 onwards, that became available with WebHelp, which is what I use.

[RoboWizard]

Hi all

I totally agree with my colleague Peter here about RoboHelp Server and multiple authoring. However, there is one aspect of it that could be perceived that way. And before Source Control was introduced, it was touted as facilitating multiple authoring from this standpoint.

What one could do is to split the content into different projects and assign each project to a different author. Then each author is "Captain of their own ship". The projects remain individual and independent. They are all published to the RoboHelp Server and combined at display time.

Cheers... Rick