Linking Word documents - how to include bookmarks

[Amebr]

Hi guys,

I'm assuming it's possible, but I haven't had any luck.

I'm trying to use the linked Word document feature. The Word document has bookmarks inserted.

Should the bookmarks be included in the html files created by Robohelp? At the moment I'm not getting any bookmarks and I can't see any settings related to including or excluding them. Are there any tricks I need to be aware of?

RH11

Word 2013

Multiscreen HTML5

[Peter Grainge]

No tricks that I am aware of. Something is nagging about using cross references in Word rather than bookmarks. Sorry. Haven't touched this for a long time.

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@petergrainge

[Amebr]

I should clarify that I'm not including any links in the document, just the bookmarks. The request was a data dictionary that they can link to individual terms in, but the dictionary itself will be managed in a Word file, so the bookmarks need to be added in the Word file and survive the import process. I'd thought I'd seen this sort of thing work years ago, but it's been literally decades since I've worked with Word source.

[Peter Grainge]

Amber

I ran a test but I was importing rather than linking, however, in this scenario I doubt it would make any difference.

I created a document and created a bookmark. When importing I left the Convert References to Hyperlinks setting unchecked. Nothing I could identify as a bookmark. I then tried again with that setting ticked, no change.

When I added a link to that bookmark and ticked the setting, the document imported with a bookmark flag in front of it.

It looks like you can't do what you want, if I have understood.

I also tried in 2019. The the bookmarked heading had an ID so it looks like it might survive in 2019. However, the ID seems to be truncated so whether it would work with multiple bookmarks is anyone's guess.

<h2><a class="generated-inline-000000" id="_Topic_1_-"></a><a class="generated-inline-000000" id="Subheading"></a><span class="DefaultParagraphFont generated-inline-000005">Topic 1 - Sub-heading</span></h2>

The bit I am still not getting is your document has bookmarks but what is the user accessing those bookmarks from?

---

See www.grainge.org for free RoboHelp and Authoring information.

@petergrainge

[Amebr]

Thanks for looking in to it, Peter.

Other documents created by the business would link to relevant entries in the data dictionary. I wouldn't be maintaining that dictionary, just generating a pretty interface for it and potentially linking to it from the documentation I maintain.

[Peter Grainge]

Once you have linked to the document, in your output it is no longer a document but an HTM page. I really can't see how bookmarks are going to work in that scenario.

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See www.grainge.org for free RoboHelp and Authoring information.

@petergrainge

[Amebr]

The link would be to the page at the web address where the RH output is hosted. But because the linking process means the htm pages can't be edited without overwriting changes on next update, the bookmarks would need to be in the Word source.

[Peter Grainge]

I'm really not with you.

1. The user has a link that is to the HTM page.
2. We have established that bookmarks only come across if the document has a link to the bookmark before the document is linked.
3. Once linked it is no longer a Word document in the output.
4. There is thus an HTM page with no bookmarks and the user of the RoboHelp output cannot see the Word document that does have the bookmark.

Somewhere along the line, I am not getting how your are expecting this to work.

---

See www.grainge.org for free RoboHelp and Authoring information.

@petergrainge

[Amebr]

I was hoping the bookmarks in the Word doc would come through into the htm file. I'd thought I'd seen it work that way years ago, but couldn't get it to work.

Now that you've confirmed that it doesn't, I'll go back to my stakeholder and let them know what they want is not possible and they'll have to investigate other options.

Edit: And the idea was that the bookmarks would be, for example, the dictionary term with underscores instead of spaces, and people who know what they're doing could link to www.mysite.com/data_dict.htm#widget_one. It would only be a subset of people creating links to individual terms (probably mostly just me, given how most non-tech-writer-people do documentation ).

[Amebr]

Oh! Oh! I might have something!

It looks like you can apply a condition code to the created htm in RH and that survives the update process.

So theoretically I can get them to include a table of contents in the Word doc and a heading with a particular style before the content, then set the import to create sepearate topics at that heading. The bookmarks created by the TOC then flow into the topic. Then I apply an Exclude condition to the TOC htm file.

Obviously needs a thorough testing, but works in a simple example. Then there's just the challenge of ensuring they apply styles correctly and refresh the TOC every time they update the doc... (What *do* they teach kids these days??)

[Peter Grainge]

Good luck with that one!

---

See www.grainge.org for free RoboHelp and Authoring information.

@petergrainge