link and search

[Launcher1]

We are in the process of choosing between RH and Flare. I thought that, with RH 6 plus RH 6 server you were able to search and link across projects - assuming of course that they are in one location.

It has been hard to find any information to confirm this, either from these forums, the Adobe site, or from a sales person.

Please can you enlighten asap?

[RoboWizard]

Hi Launcher1

Take a look at the linked Developer Center Article and see if it provides what you are looking for.

Click here to read the article

Cheers... Rick

[Launcher1]

No, this does not help.

there is no mention at all of links. the closest I get is the fact that you can search non-html topics - so one would assume that they would need to be in the same 'folder' or location?

Is the bald fact that if you want to search across your entire stable of topics/projects, you would need to have them merged into one uberproject? And that linking across them would require the same merge?

Not sure why this seems to be such an obscure thing to get information on. I imagine many authors seek this cross-link, blanket search capability.

[HKabaker]

Assuming:

--You're referring to WebHelp output, not project files;
--You want to link from a topic in WebHelp A to a topic or the launch page in WebHelp B; and
--You want the RH search function to scan both WebHelp A and WebHelp B (let's stick with 2 for now).

The link should be no problem, but you must supply the correct path. If you do it the simple way in RH, it will show as a broken link in the project explorer, but it will appear in WebHelp output.

In the RH hyperlink dialog, you have several options that include linking to a Web Address. You can place the target in New Window, parent frame, etc. I haven't tried this, but think it will not show as a broken link.

Windows security restrictions won't allow links to stray far. Crossing domains may be a problem. Corporate security also may come into play.

Safest bet is to keep the targets all in the same domain, not necessarily as a merged WebHelp package. I have a "knowledge base" on a server. It launches from an independent "master" project (not necessarily a merged project) with TOC entries and text links to other WebHelp packages. One of those packages is itself a merged project, so I get the combined TOC, Search and Index there, rather than from the "master" WebHelp.

If you want RH to search across WebHelp packages, they will have to be in a merged master project.

However, I have seen some discussion about applying some other search engine to cast a wider net. Don't know the details.

Harvey

[MergeThis]

I suspect that most of us in the forum aren't entirely sure what you mean by "able to search and link across projects." Who is searching, and at what stage, who is linking, and at what stage, etc.? (You the author, or the users?)

Actually, many of us use FAR (Find & Replace), Zenu (link checker), and ExamDiff (Compare directories & files) to assist our help authoring efforts. No product can do everything...

Can you provide some clarity on just what you're looking to do, asap? There's not much sense giving you suggestions if we're not talking the same language.


Good luck,
Leon

[Launcher1]

Sorry folks - I will try to be clearer.
We would have Flash output made up of several projects. Some outputs would be restricted to certain personnel.
When I was using RH5X at another job, the search could only scan the open output. It was my understanding that RH 6 would offer, via RH Server, the capability to search all output (not only the currently open flash item) provided of course that they were located in the same place.

I understood that RHServer would be able to search this way and return results from 'closed' output as well as the one currently open.

I also understood that similarly, one would be able to link across outputs (which would be set up in the source??)

I wonder if this makes it clearer - I hope so. thanks