Looking for WebHelp Add-ons for "Print All"

[kimcramer42]

Using RH8/TCS2. My company is delivering a context-sensitive WebHelp system with the next version of our product. In the beta period, a large customer has asked for the ability to print the entire contents of the Help system. Since this capability is not included in RH, I've been asked to look for an add-on that will enable our customers to print the entire Help. (Mgmt understands that this isn't a good idea since info can become stale, but when a customer wants something, we usually try to give it to them.)

I've created Print Doc output formats for the Help (4 of them so far, largest being 299 pgs). At the final release time, I'll output to Word, fix up the formatting, make a PDF, and post on our customer docs page. But they (mgmt) still want to provide the ability to print either the entire Help system or a book of topics at any time, so customers don't have to download the PDFs. (Yes, I know I can include a PDF in the Help, but our workflow makes that pretty challenging, so we decided to use the docs page for distribution.) What they want is some sort of right-click functionality in the Contents.

I would appreciate it if someone can recommend companies who make add-ons for RH. I've tried searching and am not having much luck finding anything. Thanks for any help you can provide!

[Peter Grainge]

There are no add-ons so that explains why you cannot find them.

The only way to do what you want is via a PDF or a number of PDFs.

The information would have to be downloaded somehow to get it to the printer so in reality there would be a download.

I suggest a page that lists the sections of the help plus an All option.

You might also like to ask your management if they would be happy if everyone in your office downloaded and printed the help from say Word? No doubt the local paper supplier would.

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See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

[MergeThis]

You might think about providing an additional HTML Help version (.chm file), which I believe still allows you to print "books" from the TOC. You could create a custom layout for this output, which would require no post-production work (pagination, etc.) such as with the Word/PDF method. However, a download would still be required.

Good luck,

Leon

[Peter Grainge]

True but don't expect the printing to be pretty. Print Book loses the styles unless you want to go to a lot of trouble.

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See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge