Can't get batch file for publish task to work

[Cyclefitness]

Here is my code saved as PublishAll.cmd:

"C:\Program Files\EC Software\HelpAndManual6\HELPMAN.EXE X:\H&M\Dev\select.hmxz /TSK=All Help Builds"

WHen I double-click this batch file, it launches Helpaman.exe, but does nothing else. What have I done wrong?

Thanks!

[Tim Green]

The quote characters are incorrect. It needs to look like this:

Code: Select all

"C:\Program Files\EC Software\HelpAndManual6\HELPMAN.EXE" X:\H&M\Dev\select.hmxz /TSK="All Help Builds"

The rule is that all individual commands that contain spaces need to be enclosed in quotes. So one set of quotes for the HELPMAN.EXE reference and one for the name of the task you are calling. If the project reference also contained a space somewhere you would need quotes there too, like this:

Code: Select all

"C:\Program Files\EC Software\HelpAndManual6\HELPMAN.EXE" "X:\Help and Manual\Dev\select.hmxz" /TSK="All Help Builds"

[Cyclefitness]

Thank you, Tim! You're the best.

[Cyclefitness]

One other question, Tim. Are the publishing tasks saved with the project so that if someone else runs the batch file, it will find the tasks?

Also am having another problem. My Task Item edits do not hold. When I right-click and choose Edit Item, then change something like the Include Options, those changes do not save even if saving the project. This is causing me incredible grief because I have four task items and each time I publish I have to remember to go and make all the configurations the same.

[waldemar.hersacher]

Are the publishing tasks saved with the project

Yes they are saved in the project. Unfortunatly they are localized so you need to have the original batch file. "All Help Builds" would be in my German installation "Letzte Exporte".

The task editor is strange. I didn't found a reproducible way what is not working so I couldn't make a bug report.

[Tim Green]

One other question, Tim. Are the publishing tasks saved with the project so that if someone else runs the batch file, it will find the tasks?

Yes, they are saved in your project. To expand on what Waldemar wrote about this: The separate batch files are only separate if you actually generate a .cmd batch file from your tasks. The tasks themselves are part of your project and are always available in that project.

Also am having another problem. My Task Item edits do not hold. When I right-click and choose Edit Item, then change something like the Include Options, those changes do not save even if saving the project. This is causing me incredible grief because I have four task items and each time I publish I have to remember to go and make all the configurations the same.

There are two possibilities I can think of here: Either your Help & Manual copy is out of date (there were problems with this in older versions) or you are editing the auto-generated "Recent Publishes" task. I am actually asking the developers to lock this task so that its actions can't be edited, because having it editable leads to a lot of mistakes. It is only there so that you can repeat recent manual publishes quickly, and the settings of the actions in are changed automatically every time you publish manually, so you can't depend on it having the settings you expect. You need to create a new task of your own for things that you really want to edit and reuse.

The current version of HM6 is 6.2.3 Build 2670 (check your version with Help > About). You can download the installer here (just install on top of your existing copy to update):

http://www.helpandmanual.com/downloads.html

[Cyclefitness]

I do have 6.2.2 and was hoping it would have been fixed in that release, but no luck. I'll download the latest version now.

[Cyclefitness]

Just installed the latest version and now the Include Options are saving, but the "Topic Status" item is not. I want it to always publish only "completed" statuses. And I have confirmed these ARE NOT the "Recent Publishes" task.

[waldemar.hersacher]

Code: Select all

          <export-task name="Exportieren als CHM" format="CHM">
            <task-config-group name="settings">
              <task-config-value name="outputfile">..\..\Output\de\ProjectA.chm</task-config-value>
              <task-config-value name="skin">..\ETLDocs.hmskin</task-config-value>
              <task-config-value name="deletetemp">1</task-config-value>
              <task-config-value name="make0include">CHM</task-config-value>
              <task-config-value name="make0status">(Complete)</task-config-value>
            </task-config-group>
          </export-task>

The complete status is saved but never read in. The checkbox will not get active and during a batch build it will not be processed.

Another thing I found.

In the batch build dialog under Edit Item I activated "Complete only" for CHM. I changed to HTML and the checkbox is already active. Next I published and the CHM has only the completed topic but HMTL has all topics. To have only the completed topics in HTML I have to deactivate and then activate the checkbox.

[Tim Green]

I've just been experimenting with this and there does appear to be a problem with the "complete only" option in the task manager. Setting it seems to be changing it for all the actions in the task, so whenever you set or reset it in one action it changes it for ALL the actions in the task. However, once it is saved it appears to remain saved for me. I'm going to have the developers check this through.