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C
ChickAD
Inspiring
June 20, 2011
Question

Navigation in Toolbar does not work after viewing unreferenced topic

  • June 20, 2011
  • 1 reply
  • 808 views

I've googled for this WebHelp issue but cannot see it despite suspecting it to be a common author's requirement. The issue affects RH7 and 9 standalone/unmerged WebHelp projects.

I have a number of simple procedures that are common to many topics in the TOC; to avoid duplication and reduce maintenance, I have set these up as topics that are not included/referenced in the TOC but are called from hyperlinked text in each topic where required.

The problem, I'm experiencing is that as soon as the user clicks through to one of the "unreferenced" topics, the navigation pane disappears; clicking on Contents, Index or Search on the toolbar has no effect. I can understand the logic of the TOC not opening: as it cannot sync -- but I don't understand why Search and Index cease to work.

Clicking the browser's back button will refresh the previous page and restore the Navigation pane and the operation of the buttons on the toolbar; however, if instead the user follows a textual link from the unreferenced topic to another topic, even one that is in the TOC, the Navigation pane remains hidden and toolbar buttons inactive. Even clicking on a referenced topic in the breadcrumb trail will not refresh the helpset but displays it with the navigation pane closed.

Can anyone help or tell me my simple error?

Regards,

Charles Addison

This topic has been closed for replies.

1 reply

Peter Grainge
Community Expert
Peter GraingeCommunity Expert
Community Expert
June 21, 2011

So the user clicks a link in the TOC, the contents of the topic pane change to required topic and then the nav pane disappears leaving just the toolbar for the tabs, is that right?

Where is the webhelp when you do this, on a server or local and what browser are you using?

Please use the camera icon to add a screenshot.

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

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C
ChickADAuthor
Inspiring
June 21, 2011

Hi Peter,

I'm using IE8 to view the help as this is our target but I've also tested with Firefox 3.6.8. The behaviour remains the same in all cases.

In addition I have tested the same System Administrator help module:

  • while resident on my C:\
  • while resident on a shared networked drive (inside and outside of my network domain); and
  • while hosted on a SharePoint server.

I spotted this problem while testing our upgrade from RH7 to RH9 but I've since tested earlier versions of the deliverables and found that the problem was there when we were using RH7; we simply missed it .

Here is the help prior to clicking on the hyperlinked text to the unreferenced-topic:

Here is the target topic with the navigation pane collapsed and clicking the index button to demonstrate that nothing happens:

On clicking "Home" in the breadcrumb trail (top right of prev. topic), the topic is displayed but the helpset does not refresh nor is there a "Show" link to open the pane, as one gets when directly opening the Home page by double-clicking:

Any help appreciated.

Regards,

Charles

Peter Grainge
Community Expert
Peter GraingeCommunity Expert
Community Expert
June 21, 2011

Can you set this up in a new test project? If you can I will take a look but I will not be around after today until next week so PDQ please.

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge

Help others by clicking Correct Answer if the question is answered. Found the answer elsewhere? Share it here. "Upvote" is for useful posts.
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