Issue with publishing

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naomi_pusch
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Joined: Tue Nov 20, 2012 10:33 pm

Issue with publishing

Unread post by naomi_pusch »

Hi Tim,
Question 1: I'm using a Master/Parent project to generate webhelp. I have multiple projects. I'd like to publish webhelp for just the topics I have marked as complete. When I publish with the Publish topics with status "Complete" only checked, I do not get the content I expect. It has the chapter without text headings (but not as chapter headings) and the actual complete topics do not publish. When I uncheck this option and have it publish all topics, it generates fine. What could be my issue?
(This appears to be a similar issue to the one you responded to earlier - you suggested generating from the child project. is that the only solution? is there some issue I could address so I could generate from the master/parent just the "complete" status topics- as I will need a few topics from each.)
Question 2: I am storing help in TFS/Visual Studio, using it as a change management tool (just checking in and checking out the files from here to my local PC). This is also where the developers of the application I am writing help for are working from. Is the option of Visual Studio help in Help and Manual something I should know about or be using? Would it be easier for the application developers if I was using this option? Would just love a non-technical translation of what this option is for...
Danke schon,
Naomi
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waldemar.hersacher
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Re: Issue with publishing

Unread post by waldemar.hersacher »

Hi Naomi,
Is the option of Visual Studio help in Help and Manual something I should know about or be using?
This option allows you to export in a format that could be integrated into the help of Visual Studio. If you are creating documentation for the developers of the application this may be an option. If you are creating the documentation for the users of the application you don't need it. The only reason to create it for the users would be if the application is a DLL or .Net assembly which other developers of their application will use in Visual Studio.

For the other question it is not clear to me which topics will not be exported. Any node and all its subnodes in the contens which is not marked as "Complete" will not be exported. This will occur even if some of the subnodes are in state "Complete".
Waldemar
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Tim Green
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Re: Issue with publishing

Unread post by Tim Green »

Hi Naomi,

Waldemar has already answered the question on Visual Studio Help -- you only need that for documenting programming components used within Visual Studio .NET and it won't work anywhere else.

As to the other question: Part of your problem may be the "chapters without text". This construct is now deprecated (that's why the option for creating it is no longer available directly in the toolbar) and we strongly recommend that it should no longer be used. Chapters without text create confusing navigation in electronic help formats, because when the user selects them nothing happens and there is no corresponding content in the topic pane -- you just continue to see whatever was in the pane before. Since they never change their effective status is always "complete" so they will always be included in output when you select the complete status only option, and if no subtopics are included you will just get an empty node.

In addition to this you should also check your conditional build options if you are also using and selecting those.
Regards,
Tim (EC Software Documentation & User Support)

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