Migrating from RH 11

[blackankle2]

I have a couple of older RH 11 Help systems that I need to move into RH 2019. I also have one RH 2015 Responsive HTML Help system to migrate to RH 2019. Any tips, warnings, advice?

[Peter Grainge]

Are you talking about upgrading to 2019 Classic or 2019 with the new UI?

If to Classic, then zip up a copy of the project before you upgrade so that you are covered if anything goes wrong. It should be straightforward.

If to the new UI, then a new project is created leaving the old version untouched. Try an upgrade to 2019 new UI direct first but if you find there are issues, then upgrade to 2019 Classic and then upgrade that to the new UI. If you have to do that, then create zip copies of your RoboHelp 11 and 2015 projects first.

Make sure your version of 2019 has all updates applied first. It should show Update 10. You don't need to update incrementally. Update 10 contains all earlier updates.

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www.grainge.org

[Amebr]

You'll probably find the SSL build expression in the Output (SSL) doesn't get applied correctly when upgrading the RH11 to RH2019.

And for anyone else reading later, if you're using Multiscreen HTML5, then you'll have to select (and customise) a new skin (screen layout).

The biggest tip is RH2019 New UI is totally different from old RH versions, so treat the upgrade like moving to a different tool and do a lot of tests on backup copies. 🙂

[Peter Grainge]

That's a decision you have to make. 2019 New UI has a learning curve.

Based on the help going into maintenance mode and the simplicity of it, using Classic is the quick and easy option as you are familiar with it.

Going forward, all development will go into the new UI so at some point you may need to transition to it.

I guess it's about when you want to do that.

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www.grainge.org

[Amebr]

Oh, and for RH 2019 New, if the content isn't in the table of contents, it won't be included in the output. So you may have baggage files you'll need to add to the TOC, and then hide from the TOC if you want to distribute them.

[blackankle2]

I tested migrating one of our help systems to RH 2019 Classic. Everything converted except the following .CSS file:

WARNING: Failed patching and copying CSS Dependencies from C:/Robotics/PRA/Help/HTMLHelp 71_GA/RHStyleMapping.css

I looked it over and it seemed pretty straightforward, but I'm no expert on CSS files, or RoboHelp. Any ideas on how to correct this problem? I feel pretty sure I will see it in the other two RH 11 help systems.

Thanks.

--- and one more thing: I can generate HTML output, but if I try to view it, I'm told that RoboHelp cannot open the chm file.

[blackankle2]

Thanks Peter. I'm new to TCS 2019 as we just have installed it. Do you recommend Classic over the new UI, or vice versa? These are old, simple 600-topic, HTML help systems that are not fancy in any way (no context sensitivity) and that are going into maintenance mode for the next couple of years. The RH 2015 Help system will have a longer life, but is much smaller (50 topics) and is output as Responsive HTML.

[Peter Grainge]

I thought that check was only made when upgrading to 2019 New UI. What happens then is the process looks at the CSS for issues and reports if they can't be fixed. In fact they might be issues that will not affect you. If you did get it with Classic, then if you can't see anything wrong, then if you don't generate Word outputs it will not matter. If you do, I would try generating one and see what happens.

See if the CHM opens if you double click in File Explorer. If it does this has been asked before so try a search. If that fails, post back as I think I know someone who will have the answer.

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www.grainge.org

[blackankle2]

Hi Peter,

I double-clicked the .chm, but got the same "cannot open" error.

I also looked for the .css file and saw that it was 0 bytes. I tried copying the existing file in and recompiling, but I got the same error.

[Peter Grainge]

I will ask about the CHM.

Are you saying your original CSS was 0 bytes? If you don't have a good backup, create a new project and lift it from there.

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www.grainge.org

[blackankle2]

The original .css was 47kb. After the conversion, it was 0kb.

I do have a good backup. and copied the original version of the RHStyleMapping.css file over the 0kb version and tried again. I can generate the OS Web Help 6 and view it. It looks good except for one thing. The contents of the master page appear at the top of each topic, with the actual topic contents below.

Any ideas on how I fix that?

[Captiv8r]

Hi there

Can you screen capture the message you are seeing WRT to opening the CHM?

[blackankle2]

I've gotten past the other issues and can generate the OS Web Help 6 and view it.

It looks good except for one thing. The contents of the master page appear at the top of each topic, with the actual topic contents below. It's like everything in the master page is loaded as a header for each topic, followec by the actual contents of the topic.

Any ideas on how I fix that?

[Peter Grainge]

That's what master pages do. Any content in the master page will get added to a new topic where it can be left or edited. After that, it's just the header and footer.

[blackankle2]

Wow. I understand what master pages do as we do that every time we add a topic, but I didn't expect to have to redo that while doing an ugpgrade. So I have to go through 600 topics on three versions of Help and manually cut and paste the content on each topic?

I was hoping the update would be a little smart than that.

[Peter Grainge]

I'm thinking maybe I misunderstood you. The upgrade should change anything. What are you seeing?

In your earlier version master page you have header content, footer content and some text in the body area, correct? Now you are seeing that body area in the new version master page?

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www.grainge.org

[blackankle2]

When generated, all of the contents of the master page appears at the top, while the actual contents of the topic follows. Here is an example, first of the output, then of what it looks like in the editor.

[Peter Grainge]

That's not what I asked. I need you to look at the master page to see what is in each section.

Can you recreate this in a mini project I can look at?

[Peter Grainge]

A master page has three sections with a gap between each. Header, body and footer.

What is in the header, what is in the body, what is in the footer and what is in the gaps?

[blackankle2]

I've worked through these problems and everything seems to be working now on these two help systems. The biggest problem was with the master page that did not convert correctly.

I did encounter a problem converting a RH 2015 Responsive HTML 5 system, but I will start a new thread on that. Thanks for your help.