Problems with "Upgrade RoboHelp Classic Project" from 2017 version to 2022

[Capacitacion37296372uaq8]

Dear all,

We are updating projects from the 2017 version of RoboHelp to the 2022 version using the "Upgrade RoboHelp Classic Project" option. In one project, the error "Upgrade project failed" appears and the process is interrupted. Although it indicates "View log", but the log is empty.

Could you help me with this issue? We do not know where the conversion error might be.

Thanks, bye

[Capacitacion37296372uaq8]

In addition, when we try to upgrade at the "Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Temp\RHTMP" folder, some logs were created. I attach them.

Thanks

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

What point version are you running this upgrade in? You probably will need to get the RH folks involved if the logs don't give you any clues as to what's going on. This is a user-to-user forum and not Support.

See https://helpx.adobe.com/contact/enterprise-support.other.html#robohelp for your Adobe Support options. I'd recommend using the tcssup@adobe.com e-mail address as it reaches a team dedicated to Technical Communication Suite products including RoboHelp.

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Have you looked at Peter's site notes on upgrades? https://www.grainge.org/RoboHelp_Tour/rh2022/introduction/upgrading.htm 

[Peter Grainge]

Did you uninstall 2017 before installing 2022? If not, the upgrade process created a new project so your old 2017 project remains intact. I would delete the CPD file, open the 2017 project in 2017 and check it is working properly and compiles.

• If it doesn't, then fix the 2017 issue whatever it is.
• If it does, try the upgrade again and if it continues to fail, then you will need to follow @Jeff_Coatsworth link to Support.

I am assuming there is nothing unusual about that project that you have not mentioned.

Let us know how that goes and if you have to go to Support, please post here what issue caused the upgrade to fail. It may help someone else.

________________________________________________________

My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Capacitacion37296372uaq8]

Thanks, 

It doesn´t work. We wrote a mail to support. When they respond   I well tell to the community the result.

Bye

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

So the project in RH2017 is working fine? What point version of RH2022 have you got installed?

[Capacitacion37296372uaq8]

Yes, it works fine. We are still working with this version because we need to continue with the documentation until we can upgrade the projet.

Bye

[Capacitacion37296372uaq8]

We are using this Version 2022.4.179.

Is this information which you asked for?

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Yes, perfect - that's the last patch (so far - June 2024). Was it installed as an Admin? Have you tried running it as an Admin and then doing the upgrade?

[Peter Grainge]

If 2022 was installed with admin rights, can you share the 2017 project? If you can, then see the Contact page on my site and send the project as instructed there. Do make sure you include a link to this thread and please do not email the project direct.

I will see what happens when I upgrade or if I can see the problem. 

________________________________________________________
My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Peter Grainge]

If it is any comfort I am seeing the same thing, the upgrade fails and the log is empty.

The root of the project is filled with hh files. How are these used within your project?

________________________________________________________

My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Peter Grainge]

I have managed to create a 2022 version of your 2017 project. 

I generated a CHM in 2017 and then followed the steps in Reverse Engingeering CHMs Method 2.

That created a new 2017 project that appears to be correct apart from those hh files. Then I went to 2022 and upgraded it without any problem. 

I did note that in 2017 there were topics with an image before a link but many were missing the image. That needs fixing.

Let me know what those hh files do and whether you would like me to send the upgraded project to you.

________________________________________________________

My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Capacitacion37296372uaq8]

Thanks Peter!!!! What a great news!!!

We tried to follow your  recomendations but we couldn´t because we couldn´t access to the link. The post said:

"Method 2 - Using Keytools

Pete Lees posted details of a free tool that decompiles the CHM file and creates the HHP file in one process. The tool is Key Tools and it was available from Ralph Walden's site - www.keyworks.net. That site appears to have been taken over by someone else and the official download is no longer there. "If you want to download it from my site you can click here.". 

But the link is not available.

We dont´n know why the project has a lot "hh" files. We are using Robohelp since 2009 version, then 2011 version and, at last, 2017 version. We saw that those files have very old date (2005, 2008, etc.) so we supose they are the result of the migrations. We erase them and compile the project in 2017 version, without problems. 

Then we try to migrate again the project to 2022 but it failed. Maybe because we can´t apply your recomendations, because we didn´t find the link. 

We apreciate your recomendations and, if you can, send us the project in 2022 version.

Thanks again!!!

Have a great day!!!!

Sara

Would you mind send us the 2022 project?

 the project. Otherwide we woukd like to look the project you migrated to 2022 version..

[Peter Grainge · Accepted solution]

I have emailed the upgraded project to you and fixed the link on my site. Also I have amended the recovery steps on my site.

________________________________________________________

My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Capacitacion37296372uaq8]

Dear Peter, We want to thank you for the enormous help you have given us. We have been able to migrate the project. As you mentioned, we had to add several topics to the table of contents so that the output generation did not give us errors. We were also able to generate the MapId file.

The only thing we haven't been able to solve is drop-down. They are visible in the project, but they are not opened in the compiled version.

If you can also help us with this, we would greatly appreciate it.

Bye

[Peter Grainge]

It's late here but I think someone posted a few days ago about the same issue with an upgrade. See if you can find that thread.

I'll take a look at your project tomorrow.

________________________________________________________
My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Peter Grainge]

Save me some time, name a folder and topic that has a popup in it.

________________________________________________________
My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Peter Grainge]

Original reply removed. I went off at a tangent and was looking at popups, not dropdowns. Looking again with coffee onboard!

________________________________________________________

My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Peter Grainge · Accepted solution]

This is not the news you want.

I realised the reason the dropdowns are not working is almost certainly a byproduct of the way I managed to upgrade the project using KeyTools. Quite simply it is not recovering what the source project needs to make the dropdowns work.

On my site there are some scripts that Willam van Weelden wrote many years ago that can be found at https://www.grainge.org/RoboHelp/Scripts/Scripts.htm. I tried the CHM Recovery script and that is not working. It creates a new project but without any topics. I strongly suspect that is because of the initial problem with upgrading the conventional way.

I am out of further options and I think you have only two ways forward.

• I suggest for this one you now need to go to Adobe Support. See https://helpx.adobe.com/contact/enterprise-support.other.html#robohelp for your Adobe Support options. The email link tcssup@adobe.com is recommended as it reaches a team dedicated to Technical Communication Suite products including RoboHelp.
  You could point Support to this thread so that they can see what has been tried. Hover the mouse over the date in the first post to add a link to your clipboard.
• Recreate the dropdowns. 

It looks like recreation would be a bit of a nightmare so try Support first. Let me know how you get on.

________________________________________________________

My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Capacitacion37296372uaq8]

Thanks a lot,

We are going to contact Robohelp Support, then we will tell you the result.

Bye

[Sara38620952gjlx]

Hi Peter,

We contacted the Adobe Support and they tell us that the only way to upgrade projects from 2017 to 2022 without problems, such as broken dropdowns, is to upgrade 2017 to 2019, and then from 2019 to 2022 version. We are working on this, but without success until now, because we need to install the 2019 version first and we don't have it. Regards

[Amebr]

Just as a side note, I suspect the .hh files were related to context sensitive help (CSH). I believe it is an alternate extension that developers might provide similar to the .h file that is normally mentioned in relation to CSH.

[Peter Grainge]

I'm pretty sure I tried that route and it didn't fix the upgrade to 2022 issue. I'll check in the morning. 

________________________________________________________
My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Peter Grainge]

Go back to Support and tell them that I tried that route and the using 2022.4 to upgrade the project in 2019 format does not work either. Offer to send them the project and/or suggest a screenshare.

________________________________________________________

My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.