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A
Anonymous
May 20, 2008
Question

Problems with Word Import

  • May 20, 2008
  • 12 replies
  • 2912 views
I work for a company that uses Microsoft Word as the primary tool for developing documentation. We then import the docs into RH5 creating topics by heading levels.

I downloaded the RH7 30 day trial and I noticed when I imported the docs it would not split by heading styles. Instead it just lumped evything together based on my heading 1 style with the sublevels linked to the heading1 topics. I could not find a way to unlink the topics so that I can reorganize and reuse content. Also when I clicked on a topic it appeared as just one long topic.

Not sure if this is a limitation of the trial, but any support would be welcome, since my company is trying to decide if we will upgrade.

Also on a side note, i was curious what peoples experience where with converting styles on import with RH7. RH5 had this feature but it had many issues with crashing and not being able to convert some style elements from word.
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F-Techie
Participating Frequently
June 3, 2008
I'm facing the same problem. So if anyone has a solution please advice..
A
Anonymous
June 9, 2008
I know you have moved on to the issues with graphics but if you are still having problems with headings. I have found another solution, since for me I was using word default heading 1,2,3 with just modifications for our styleguide so that was not the problem. another thing I have noticed that may be your as well is listed below:

THE PROBLEM: The problem seems to be unique with RH7 since i did not have this issue in RH5, but the root seems to be with the way word handles styles. For things like paragraph styles you can click on on a paragraph(not highlight) and apply the style. This works in word but this causes problems with Robo Help. so if you apply a paragraph style w/o highlighting then apply a character empahsis style on a word...you would notice in RH5 that the paragraph would be highlighted from that word on. Somehow in RH7 this issue now also causes problems with creating topics and not just with in topic formatting.

THE SOLUTION: This solution is time consuming, but you will have to go back and reapply your styles to your document. The best way to do this is to select a group of text you will format such as a body paragraph or a heading and CLEAR FORMATING. Sometimes you will not be able to clear format...if this happens you probably do not have the entire paragraph highlighted (this is a likely culprit of the problem). When re-applying the styles make sure to apply styles in the following order to prevent issues.
1. Apply Body or Paragraph styles.
2. Apply numbering or bulletings styles.
3. Apply character Emphasis Styles.
Remember you must clear the formatting before you re-apply or the issue will not resolve.Since this can be time consuming I suggest trying this on a few heading first starting from the top of the document just to make sure this works for you.
A
Anonymous
June 30, 2008
Leo and others,
This problem has frustrated me beyond belief. I have been having the same issue with importing word docs. I was so happy to see Leo's post here thinking he had found the culprit. The document I'm trying to import was created by a 3rd party years ago. It seems to be formatted very well yet RoboCrap doesn't want to split on the custom headings. It chooses things like TOC, inlinetext, etc. I am about to just reformat the entire doc and import which seems to be the only solution. I am tinkering with your idea right now Leo but have not had the same luck you had. I may not be doing it correctly. Could you spell out the process of clearing the heading format then re-applying a little more?

Thanks in advance!
RoboColum_n_
RoboColum_n_
Legend
May 20, 2008
Hi LeoFirebrand and welcome to the RH forums.

First off, the trial is a fully working version with no limitiations. As far as maintaining the numbered headings, this can't be done if you are maintaining the source in RH. Each time you add a topic in the middle of a book, you'd have to update all the page titles and topic properties.

You may want to check out this link for help with importing word docs and how to map your Word styles to RH's styles. I'd strongly advise you to tidy up styles in your Word Docs before you import them.
A
Anonymous
May 20, 2008
Thanks for the links to the style information, some good stuff there.

As far as my headings issues, i may need to clarify a bit more. It's something that is working with RH5 that I am having problems with in RH7. Basically in RH5 I would say import word doc, then it would ask what heading styles to create topics by. I would check Headings 1-4 and import. It would then create new topics for each heading level in my doc and create books stacking them by levels. so heading 2s would be stacked in a topic for the Heading 1 it links to.

with RH7 i did the same process but when it imports it only created topics based on the highest heading level and when I view the topic it has pages worth of content including multiple headings. it does not appear to be working....or it works differently than it used to.
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