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HelpAuthor1
Participating Frequently
August 21, 2014
Question

Can RH11 publish to TFS without using it for source control?

  • August 21, 2014
  • 1 reply
  • 390 views

I am on a desktop, Windows 8, RH11.

I currently am not using TFS or SharePoint for source control, but need to put my publish files on TFS for the development team to pull into automated builds.

Is there a special way to do this? any settings that I need to be aware of?

As a side note, I am considering whether to use TFS or SharePoint as my source control and leaning toward SharePoint because we would like to publish other files such as a knowledgebase onto SharePoint and I want to use the Resource Manager as well.

Thank you,

Susan

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1 reply

Willam van Weelden
Willam van Weelden
Inspiring
August 26, 2014

What do you mean with 'publish'? As far as I know, you can't use the publish option in RoboHelp to put your output in TFS. You can generate your output to a specific directory and your developers can pick up your output and put it in TFS. There is nothing special to be aware of. Just make sure that the developers pick up all the files (including subfolders) and put that into source control.

With source control, the easiest option is usually the best. Here are the three global options:

  • Use SharePoint for version control: This is very easy to set up and if you are a SharePoint administrator you don't need any IT guys helping out. This is by far the simplest way to go.
    • You will need SharePoint 2010 or 2013. SharePoint 365 doesn't work.
    • If you have SharePoint there is no additional cost involved.
  • Use RoboSourceControl: This is the source control system included in RoboHelp itself.
    • It works rather well, but it is a pain to set up. You need a database (and a server to host that) and connect every team member to the source control system.
    • You will require the support of an IT guy. I normally advise against this system because it is so problematic to set up.
    • There is no additional cost for this option.
  • Use the source control system your developers use. If your developers use a source control system that support the Microsoft SCC API, you can use that source controlsystem.
    • The advantage of these systems is that they are generally more rubust than SharePoint, they are optimized for speed and they offer many advanced features that SharePoint lacks such as check in policies, integration with issue trackers, reports, etc.
    • The knowlegde of this system is already in house so no consulting will be required for this side.
    • You will need the support of the manager of the source control system and most likely also the support of an IT guy.
    • You will be able to get a complete version of a project from a specific label/date/etc at once. With SharePoint you can only get older versions of individual files.
    • Depending on your licensing structure, this option may require more additional licenses.
My advise is to choose for either SharePoint or the source control your developers use. Your management might prefer to have all content in a single repository and so choose the third option. In any way, backups will be made centrally and you will have the capability of comparing files between different versions.

If you want to quickly get older versions and have advanced reports on check in history, number of changes, etc. Then the third option is the way to go. If you only need older versions of single files and you want to get it done tomorrow, go for SharePoint.

Kind regards,

Willam

H
HelpAuthor1Author
Participating Frequently
August 28, 2014

Thanks Willam,

I had a choice between TFS and SharePoint. We have decided to publish to a web server for the output and Link the Help Button in our application to the site page to open Help. We are using SharePoint for Source Control (yes, easy but I also don't have anything to compare it to and didn't try to set things up in TFS). From here, I have to determine how contextual search will be built using the website versus having the help loaded into the application.

Thank you again,

Susan

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