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June 27, 2008
Answered

Asian characters in TOC

Hi,

I'm using Robohelp 7.0.2 and I'm having problems getting Japanese and Chinese characters to display correctly in the TOC of my project.

My HHC and HHK files are correctly encoded as UTF-8 and show up correctly in the main Robohelp interface. My topics also display correctly. I also have a german translation and everything (including ulmhauts show up correctly) in all contexts.

However, when I export the CHM, the text in the TOC and in the index show up as question marks. The problem most likely comes from a hidden setting somewhere, but can someone point me in the right direction?

Thanks
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    Correct answer
    June 27, 2008
    I have found out that changing Robohelp's language setting allowed me to correctly generate the CHMs.

    This is however unacceptable from a software that claims to support 35 languages. It should be possible to run the software without always having to change its language setting back and forth...

    8 replies

    Peter Grainge
    Community Expert
    Community Expert
    June 30, 2008
    Submit it as a request but my guess would be that they cannot change the PC's language and it is that which has to be changed.

    http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/mmform/index.cfm?name=wishform

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    July 1, 2008
    Actually, all I needed to do was to change RoboHelp's language setting and have the support for Asian languages installed on the computer, so what Elisa was suggesting might be a good idea.
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    Peter Grainge
    Community Expert
    Community Expert
    June 27, 2008
    I don't think this is anything Adobe can change. They have to use the MS Help Compiler like all other HATs and Adobe cannot change how that works. Adobe make it possible to create topics in the source, then you have to generate the way that the MS Help Compiler dictates.


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    June 30, 2008
    Might it be possible for RoboHelp to add a RoboHelp-language-setting step to the Single Source Layout for .chms?

    I was thinking that if I were running from a command line, I could run a setup command before running the Microsoft HTML Compiler command. If this is something that could be saved in the .ssl file itself, it would allow users to generate a project in different languages. (Oo, maybe even using conditional build tags!)

    Would something like this work? I don't know enough about the compilers and .ssls to know.

    Elisa
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    Participating Frequently
    June 27, 2008
    Hi, Julien,

    I believe it's necessary to set the default language of your machine to Japanese or Chinese before you compile HTML Help files in these languages. See this thread in the RoboHelp for HTMLHelp forum:

    issues with the TOC and index

    And also this article on the Helpware site:

    Japanese HTML Help Setup

    Pete
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    June 27, 2008
    Thanks Pete for the fast answer.

    However, despite changing my localization to Japanese, it didn't solve my problems. However, it really seems like a computer configuration issue, as the CHM files that were sent to me by the translation office correctly had their TOC and index in Japanese and Chinese.

    This is perhaps due to the fact that I'm running Windows Vista 64?

    Thanks,
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    Correct answer
    June 27, 2008
    I have found out that changing Robohelp's language setting allowed me to correctly generate the CHMs.

    This is however unacceptable from a software that claims to support 35 languages. It should be possible to run the software without always having to change its language setting back and forth...
    Translate
    Peter Grainge
    Community Expert
    Community Expert
    June 27, 2008
    There is some information about these characters in the Using RH7 article on my site.

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