Re: HTML Help print issue

[Sandy Harris <sandy -at- storm -dot- ca>]

Diamanti wrote:

> The help files for our product are it for comprehensive procedures.
> Creating them with RoboHelp 2000 went just fine, except that when Test waded
> in to do their thing, they wanted to print everything out first.  From the
> HTML Help viewer you have the option to print a single topic or all topics,
> so the tester chose all.  The first topic printed correctly; the second was
> indented, and the third abandoned the style sheet and appeared in a fetching
> but confusing boldface type.  Does anyone have a clue as to why the printing
> is funky?

Look at the HTML with a text editor. Missing tags can cause the errors you 
describe. Not closing a list can leave the following text indented to list
depth, not closing a heading can leave all following text bolded, and so on.

If possible, use two monitors or one huge one with two windows so you can
simultaneously see the text in a browser and in an editor. This makes it
relatively easy to locate such errors.

w3c.org has an HTML validator program that will find and report such errors,
an HTML tidy utility that automatically fixes them, and a browser/editor
named Amaya that also fixes them. All are free downloads, and Open Source.
 
> Also, when the help is printed from our browser-based (IE5.5) product, a
> run-time error occurs.  When the print is invoked elsewhere, yet another
> printing error occurs.  Again, any clues?

Is this real HTML (as defined by w3c.org) or some proprietary format
resembling HTML?

If it actually HTML, you can:

	try printing it from Netscape, Opera, Amaya, any browser you can
	  lay your hands on
	read it into MS Word or Star Office, most any word processing
	   package, and print from there
	use a 'lynx --dump' command for the free Lynx text-only browser
	  this gives a fairly ugly but usable plain ASCII output, and can
	  be done in batch mode to convert many files very quickly
	download the htmldoc tool (free, but they charge for support)
	  from www.easysw.com. Given a group of HTML files it will
	  generate PDF or Postscript with a global table of contents.

I'd suggest trying htmldoc. Works fine for me, on both Windows and
Linux.

If it's not actually HTML, I've no idea of a solution. I'm not even
certain there is one. All I can see to do (assuming you've already
read TFM) is talk to tech support for Robohelp and the viewer. It
sounds like at least one of them has at least one ghastly bug. With
any luck, they'll also have fixes.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Collect Royalties, Not Rejection Letters! Tell us your rejection story when you 
submit your manuscript to iUniverse Nov. 6 -Dec. 15 and get five free copies of 
your book. What are you waiting for? http://www.iuniverse.com/media/techwr

Have you looked at the new content on TECHWR-L lately?
See http://www.raycomm.com/techwhirl/ and check it out.

---
You are currently subscribed to techwr-l as: archive -at- raycomm -dot- com
To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-techwr-l-obscured -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com
Send administrative questions to ejray -at- raycomm -dot- com -dot-  Visit 
http://www.raycomm.com/techwhirl/ for more resources and info.