A most amazing HTML stumble

Please post all questions and comments regarding Help & Manual 7 here.

Moderators: Alexander Halser, Tim Green

Post Reply
Dave Gehman
Posts: 575
Joined: Sat Sep 23, 2017 9:05 pm

A most amazing HTML stumble

Unread post by Dave Gehman »

First, let me say that I know H+M says that whatever I put into "insert HTML code object" is all mine to figure out. So, Tim, if if need to be turned away, no hard feelings.

H+M7
WebHelp output
Windows 10 64 bit -- all up to date because I haven't found a way to keep Microsoft from inflicting updates on me
Dell Precision workstation with a single Xeon processor and 12 GB ram.
Situation below is in local WebHelp output in Chrome on my machine. We haven't uploaded the help file to our server.

This is an interesting situation where everything is working except with one file, and it seems to be the name of the file that causes the problem.

The Interesting Situation:
IFrame makes calls from a directory in which a "designs-index.html", "globals.html", and "js-index.html" reside. Each acts as a literal index for about 200 HTML files (which are src-ed into subtopics in H+M via Insert HTML code object: iframe... and those all work). They become a valuable resource for our users as files wend their way through the iFrame window in our H+M help.

When the IFrame src="designs-index.html" or src="js-index.html, all works as advertised (thanks, Martin Wynne!)
Change the IFrame source to src="globals.html" and it's Status 404-file not found

my src= is:
1. spelled correctly
2. definitely in the source directory
3. has correct H+M HTML object/iframe syntax (or at least it works identically with the other hundred+ src html files)
3. when I change the supposedly 404 file's name from "globals.html" to "js-index.html" (changing the original js-index.html to js-index.html.old) the file formerly known as global.html now works.

Is there something in H+M that precludes reaching out to a file named "globals.html"?
(I can't find any web-ish proscription against that file name in an Internet search.)

Interesting other situation:
All of the src= files contain a version number. It's hard-coded into each respective html file, not created dynamically from CSS or JS. Across the board, html files that contain "v.1.21.40" hard-coded into them... show up as "v.1.20.38" (the previous version number). Chrome's CTRL+F5, forcing an update, has no effect. The rest of the content is as coded into the source HTML files, and several of them include noticeable changes that happened between 1.20.38 and 1.21.40 -- those changes are there on-screen.

I will reboot Windows soon after posting this. I have already closed and then re-opened H+M.

Any help is welcome.

EDIT: no change after Windows restart / closing H+M prior to restarting.
User avatar
Tim Green
Site Admin
Posts: 23153
Joined: Mon Jun 24, 2002 9:11 am
Location: Bruehl, Germany
Contact:

Re: A most amazing HTML stumble

Unread post by Tim Green »

Hi Dave,

Whatever the specific cause, that file name is conflicting with something. You could check whether your project has a topic with "globals" set to its ID (no difference if there are upper case characters), although that is unlikely. Another thing to do in Chrome is press F12 to open the developer console, then in the browser itself right-click on the reload button and select the option to do a hard reload and clear the cache.

Ultimately, however, it's not worth spending much time on. If changing the name allows you to find the file, then just change the name. 8)
Regards,
Tim (EC Software Documentation & User Support)

Private support:
Please do not email or PM me with private support requests -- post to the forum directly.
User avatar
Martin Wynne
Posts: 2656
Joined: Mon May 12, 2003 3:21 pm
Location: West of the Severn, UK

Re: A most amazing HTML stumble

Unread post by Martin Wynne »

Hi Dave,

"global" is a reserved word in several languages, including PHP.

I'm not suggesting that's the explanation in this case, but it's the sort of word I would avoid in a file name. I would try at least to modify anything I'm not sure about with an underscore -- "abc_globals".
Chrome's CTRL+F5, forcing an update, has no effect.
Make sure the iframe content has focus (i.e. click on it) before doing CTRL+F5. It's a separate web page, and refreshing the containing page won't affect it.

Having said that, overriding the cached content in an iframe is a constant battle of wits. The easy solution is to use .php file extensions for everything, instead of .html. See: https://helpman.it-authoring.com/viewto ... 908#p67908

n.b. the .php setting is not honoured in HM8 for embedded HelpXplain infographics.

cheers,

Martin.
Dave Gehman
Posts: 575
Joined: Sat Sep 23, 2017 9:05 pm

Re: A most amazing HTML stumble

Unread post by Dave Gehman »

Thanks, Martin & Tim.

I have to do further testing.

At this point, now none of the iframe src= sources work in the local (internal) site generated by HM7 or HM8. I'll have to deploy via the Web, that is, from our external server to do further diagnostics.

(Worked fine until a day or so ago -- might be a Chrome update such that it clamps down even further that it used to on loading local references).
Post Reply