Table style

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John Johann
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Joined: Mon Aug 21, 2017 7:35 pm

Table style

Unread post by John Johann »

Hi,
Is it possible to create a table style with NO vertical lines -- only horizontal lines.

I'd like to store it in a repository and apply as required.
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Tim Green
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Re: Table style

Unread post by Tim Green »

Hi John,

Currently table styles only store those settings available in the configuration dialog for table styles. So borders are either on or off for all sides. You can't currently do something like define only vertical or only horizontal lines in a style.

However, you can do that for individual tables using the Selected Cells options in the table properties dialog. You can then create a dummy table with exactly the formatting you need and save it as an XML snippet, and insert that snippet every time you want to use a table with that complex style. (You could still use a table style for the basic formatting on top of that.) See here for information on using snippets:

http://www.helpandmanual.com/help/index ... ippets.htm
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Tim (EC Software Documentation & User Support)

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John Johann
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Joined: Mon Aug 21, 2017 7:35 pm

Re: Table style

Unread post by John Johann »

Hi Tim,
As ever, thanks for replying so fast!
I may have found a solution I can work with.

My output formats will hopefully be CHM and also docx / pdf.

If I:
1) Define a style with name "TableABC"
2) Make no changes to the "Screen view" settings
3) Adjust my "Print Manual View" to what I want
4) Add a "TableABC" css block to my skin with the necessary formatting
5) Publish to CHM --> css settings are applied
6) Publish to PDF/ DOCX --> "Print Manual Settings" are applied

Anything I need to watch out for with this solution?

NEXT QUESTION:
When I publish to docx, style names with e.g. "H&M Heading1" are output. I would like to use the styles already defined in the docx template -- is there a switch for this?

LAST QUESTION:
I installed the current beta version for the SVG export functionality.
In my test project, I have a screenshot ABC.gif and a drawing ABC.svg.
The SVG is in a table at the top of the page.
The GIF is in a toggle element further down.

When I publish to CHM, all is as expected.
When I publish to PDF, all is as expected.
When I publish to DOCX, the SVG is converted to non-vector format and used at both positions.
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Tim Green
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Re: Table style

Unread post by Tim Green »

Hi John,
Anything I need to watch out for with this solution?
Not at all, that sounds fine and it's an excellent hack! 8)
When I publish to docx, style names with e.g. "H&M Heading1" are output. I would like to use the styles already defined in the docx template -- is there a switch for this?
I'm afraid not, because of the way the export system works, at least at the moment. In all output formats, Help+Manual assumes that the styles in your project have control over the formatting of the content (what you edit in the topic editor). The templates and skins for the various output formats are responsible for the formatting of everything else. For this to work in DOCX, Help+Manual must add its own styles to the DOCX file's stylesheet. As things work at the moment, even if it did use style names that already existed in the DOCX template, it would overwrite them when merging the content from the project with the template.

We may change this in the future but it would be a major change and it would also run against the basic formatting principle of Help+Manual at the moment, which is that you create your stylesheet in the project.
When I publish to DOCX, the SVG is converted to non-vector format and used at both positions.
This is because Word doesn't generally support SVG yet, so Help+Manual automatically converts to PNG for maximum compatibility. Currently, only Word 2016 with an Office 365 subscription supports scalable vector graphics in DOCX files, so adding them would result in incompatible graphics for the huge number of users on earlier versions.

Would an option to force the export of SVG be useful? We've hesitated to provide it so far because of the possible compatibility repercussions. :?
Regards,
Tim (EC Software Documentation & User Support)

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John Johann
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Re: Table style

Unread post by John Johann »

Hi Tim,

Export to SVG in Word isn't really a requirement at the moment -- EMF could be a possibility.
Apart from that, I am hoping to go single source and thus output to CHM and PDF for those wanting a print-out. Word exporting is more for the transition period.

(V 7.3.2 Build 4241 Beta) I need to clarify my issue -- when I exported to Word, the screenshot was replaced by the other -- wrong -- image (an SVG). I tried again with a default docx template -- no difference.
The images have the same name, just a different ending (ABC.png, ABC.svg).

I repeated the test by just duplicating the screenshot (ABC - Kopie.png, ABC.svg) and linking to the copy -- that worked.

I repeated the test again and swapped the order of the images myself (ABC.svg, ABC.png) -- the second image was replaced with the first one in the Word export. So it would appear to be a problem when the images have the same name but a different ending.
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Tim Green
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Re: Table style

Unread post by Tim Green »

John Johann wrote:(V 7.3.2 Build 4241 Beta) I need to clarify my issue -- when I exported to Word, the screenshot was replaced by the other -- wrong -- image (an SVG). I tried again with a default docx template -- no difference.
This is caused by the way that H&M locates images: In your project only the image name is stored, without any path information. H&M finds the images by searching all the paths listed in your Project Search Path (in Project Explorer > Configuration > Common Properties) and using the FIRST image that it finds with a matching name. If you have multiple images with identical names in more than one folder H&M will only ever see the first image. This also applies to modular projects merged at publish time.

Images with identical names and different extensions are also affected. Images frequently need to be converted when you generate your output and this changes the extensions. If the image names are the same you will have a conflict across different output formats and may get different images in the same location in different formats because of it. Rather than trying to keep track of which image formats might be affected, it is much better to assume that all names that are the same before the extension can cause conflicts and to avoid them.

This has both an upside and a downside: The upside is that it makes your projects completely portable and enables you change the source and locations of your images very easily -- you just need to change the image locations in the Project Search Path. The downside is that you have to be careful to avoid images with identical names in the same project, including modular projects.

The only way to solve this problem is to make sure that you do not use duplicate image names, even if the files have different extensions. This is covered along with good strategies for avoiding the problem in this topic in the Help & Manual help:

Basic Working Procedures > Using Graphics > Managing your graphics
Regards,
Tim (EC Software Documentation & User Support)

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John Johann
Posts: 305
Joined: Mon Aug 21, 2017 7:35 pm

Re: Table style

Unread post by John Johann »

Thanks -- had read that part, just thought it was more about same names in different folders than same names with different extensions.
The fact that it did not apply to the CHM and PDF exports (they were both o.k.) is also a little confusing.
Maybe an idea to add the info on the extensions to the help -- just to make it really clear :-)
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