More "Parameter is incorrect"

[Guest]

I have used RoboHelp for years and never had to bother with printed documentation. So this is something new for me, but I whenever I try it I get "The parameter is incorrect" error message, click OK, the program dies. I have looked at all the information in these pages and tried any cure that made sense with no success at all. I have tried using a very basic project containing just a couple of simple topics but any project I try and the program crashes. I've also tried juggling the layout properties but nothing makes and difference. I suspect the cause maybe something external to RH. I have Word (Office) 2007 installed and it appears that RH 'knows' where the winword executable is so I have run out of ideas. Does anyone have a suggestion that I can try to get passed this?

[RoboColum_n_]

Hi mrcrispin_too and welcome to the RH community.

You'll have to give us a little more to go on. What version of RH? Are you using RH HTML or RH for Word?

[Guest]

Thank you for your response Colum. I put the version in the summary but it's RH7.0.3.001 and it is identified as RoboHelp HTML.

Brian.

P.S. Since the question came up I thought I'd try running RoboHelp for Word and it doesn't start at all. How significant might that be?

[Peter Grainge]

Try setting your Word security settings to medium instead of the default high.

[Guest]

Thank you for the input Peter. I got RoboHelp for Word working by doing an installation repair. Didn't help. Took a look at the Word 2007 options but there's no general (single) security option, at least not one I can find.

I tinkered with whatever settings looked like they may help in the 'Trust Center', like making sure the directories where the projects are stored are 'trusted', but without effect.

Day is past done here now (UK) so if I have the time tomorrow I may try a complete uninstall and clear-out before doing a clean install.

Brian.

[RoboWizard]

Hi there

Before attempting the uninstall reinstall hokey pokey...

Perhaps try creating a new layout?

Cheers... Rick

[RoboColum_n_]

In MS Office 2007 the security settings are in the Developer ribbon which is ever so helpfully hidden from view by deault. If you click on the MS Office button and click Word Options, then click Popular, you'll see a "Show Developer Tab in the Ribbon" option. Don't you just LOVE Office 2007!

[Peter Grainge]

There are two ways to the security settings but you end up in the same place. Either as Colum has said but whilst you are in Word Options setting that up, you might as well go into the Trust Centre and click the Settings button. Try Enable All Macros.

Post back if that and Rick's suggestion do not work.

Well aware of the UK time. That's where I am.

[Guest]

Thanks for all the suggestions. As I said in my opening post I have been testing using a very basic project containing just a couple of simple topics and I have tried several new layouts. Also deleted the PSS and CPD files. I have turned off every security option I can find. Can't afford to spend much more time on this, if a full re-install doesn't fix this I will be forced to abandon Robo altogether and painfully import each and every topic into a new Word file.

[Peter Grainge]

Saying that you tried all security options you can find is not saying that you have tried the one I suggested.

Is your Word normal.dot on your hard disk? Some networks have it on a network drive and I believe, but am not 100% sure, that can cause problems.

Go for the uninstall and reinstall and post back. Don't give up as there has to be a reason. Can you turn virus checking off temporarily as that very occasionally has caused problems.

Don't forget your logon must have admin rights.

[Guest]

Sorry Peter, I should have said but I did try all the settings you suggested. Also everything is local, nothing is on a network and I do have admin rights, at least as far as Vista is concerned. That set me thinking, so I started Robo with 'Run as Administrator', but that didn't help. When I get this mornings bunch of support issues out of the way I'll roll my sleeves up and do the uninstall.

Thanks again for your help.
Brian.

[Guest]

:-(

Well I did a complete and thorough uninstall, deleting everything, followed by deleting all the obvious stuff from the registry and then running a registry clean-up program.

I installed and checked each update 7.00, 7.01, 7.02, 7.03 separately for the printed document action and no change at all. RH still crashed each time. I also ran a diagnostic on the Office 2007 installation, nothing showed up.

Haven't a clue what else to try.

[Peter Grainge]

Open one of the sample projects. Use one of the existing print layouts without changing any settings.

Still crashing?

If yes, where is normal.dot located?

[Guest]

There are no existing printed document layouts, never used the option until this weekend. I just use the defaults and switch from .pdf to .doc, though I have tried fiddling with other settings to no effect. I get the problem if I simply use 'New', give the project a name like 'test' and without doing any editing of any sort immediately use 'Printed Document'. The program dies everytime.

The 'normal.dotm' file is in "C:\Users\BPalmer\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates" along with a collection of .dot files clearly placed there by RH.

I took a look at the Vista event log but the only thing gleaned from that is that the failure relates to the 'ntdll.dll module'. I opened an 'event' with Adobe Support and yesterday and today added the full event report to that but so far I've had nothing from them.

Any chance that RH doesn't support Office (Word) 2007? Didn't think to check the knowledge base for that simple fact.

It would help a lot if I knew which flamin' parameter was incorrect, as an error message it's worse than useless.

All versions of RH have been pretty unstable and I've put up with a lot of crashing since version 9 and have learnt how to avoid most, but this is getting close to being the last straw.

[RoboColum_n_]

Hang in there mrcrispin_too. There are thousands of happy users generating printed documentation so the fault should be solvable. Office 2007 is supported by RH7 and above so you have no issue there. Don't suppose you have side by side Office installs (e.g. 2003 and 2007)?

[Peter Grainge]

The Customer Care sample project very definitely has printed document layouts under Single Source Layouts.

There has to be something wrong with your environment as I run it on six machines without any crashing, or at least very rarely. Stick with us and we should be able to identify the issue.

What virus checker do you use?

[Guest]

Thank you for your continued support.

I only have Office 2007, never used any other version on this (relatively) new PC. I use AVG 7.5 anti-virus but I turned it off completely as part of my tests. If you think it's worth doing I suppose I could remove it completely and try.

There are UK and US printed document layouts for the Customer Care sample and they both crash the program.

Brian.

[Guest]

On the advice of Annie from Adobe support I tried a brand new login with admin rights and having enabled all macros etc, I was able to generate a printed output. Armed with the fact that it would work I looked for whatever it is in my account/login that caused it to fail. Completely without successs.

However, I now have a way to get what I need, so thank you everyone for your help but I'm not going to waste any more time on this.

Cheers,
Brian.

[Peter Grainge]

I hate that solution because as you will have discovered, all your software settings are now lost, not just RH.

[Guest · Accepted solution]

It's not ideal I know and I also really hate not having a 'proper' answer but in the future I will only be using RH to produce JavaHelp. The organisation I now work for (took us over) uses 'Author It' so I basically only need the printed documentation output to do a 'one-time' conversion and switching to another login just to do that is acceptable.

Thank you very much for the time you put in to helping me resolve the issue but I think it can now be closed.

Cheers,
Brian

[Izamal1]

Am having the "Parameter is incorrect" msg displaying when I try to open or try to right click on Printed Documentation. This is in RH 6. (I have RH6 Build 099 and RH8 installed on different drives on my work-supplied computer. OS is XP SP2. Have Office 2003. All files I'm working with are on my harddrive, not the intranet.)

This is the first I've seen this problem, have been producing .doc versions (and useless pdf versions), cleaning them up manually, and then (outside of RH) generating a pdf from the cleaned up .doc. (It is the first time I've tried to generate printed docs from RH6 since installing RH8. The print request is supposed to be a fast response type job, so I haven't gone through the agony of updating the help file to RH8, even though it's a small project, since there are many graphics that I'd have to re-enter.)

I cannot clear the "P is i" msg in RH. Have to end program through Task Master.

I can print the doc (doc and pdf) despite the error msg, but I cannot go in and check/reset settings for the docs.

Any suggestions would be appreciated (except to use Flare, not my boss' flavor).

[Peter Grainge]

See Snippet 73 on my site.

[Izamal1]

Thanks for such a rapid reply.

I'd already tried, per your Snippet, Doug Wood's suggestion of deleting the *.pss file. Still had/have same trouble. I cannot go into the properties used to generate printed documentation. The error message is very persistent.

(Incidentally, what a fantastic resource your website is, Peter.)

[Peter Grainge]

Have you tried creating a new layout? Don't duplicate the existing one.

[Izamal1]

Thanks again. Right now, heading into a 3rd hour on a 30 min task, I'll manually correct the .doc version, and play later with RoboHelp when I can. I'll report back if creating a new layout does it, but not today. (I'm copy topics that did not show up in the printed documentation from the .htm files. Will then have to change the hyperlinks in the .doc version to bookmarks, since the hyperlinks are pointing to the .htm files (!).
None of this ever happened to me before. About now is my 1 yr anniversary working off and on in RH 6.

Oh, some humor, I started looking at RH 8, but when I was told to view the TOC pod... I love that RH's Help usues terminology that assumes you know part of the answer to begin with. It took a few minutes to discover what a "pod" is in RH 7 and RH 8. Back now to clean up my .doc version.