reproducible fatal error when heading 2/3 are mapped

[Z__Bulova]

Hello, I am totally unable to map my Headings 2 & 3, for some unknown reason. Whenever I map one, both, or either of these two styles (about which I can see nothing unusual), I get a fatal error from the Microsoft help engine when I try to compile. This error is extremely time consuming to resolve, considering how I have to go through majorly memory-intensive operations (Edit Style settings and Force Update), not to mention the periodic and miscellaneous crashes of the program, and sometimes I have to reboot to recover from the fatal error and/or crashes. Nonetheless, I have isolated this problem down to mapping these two styles and it is fully reproducible. Does anyone know what would cause my headings 2 and 3 to cause this problem? Heading 1 maps fine.

Thank you for any insight you may be able to offer on my situation.

Z.

[Maryann8]

I have had a similar problem that I have pinned down to something bad happening while the final TOC is being compiled, after all the conversions of the FM files have been done.
I blew nearly a day troubleshooting, and I can find nothing wrong or unusual with my FM files, including the TOC. In fact, earlier, I successfully performed force updates several times.

Fix:
I finally gave up troubleshooting, and started a new RoboHelp project from scratch, using the same setup, and the same edited fmstyles.css. The new project worked fine, and I was able to produce a .chm file, no problem.

Here are my notes:
Symptom: final .chm file won't open

Background: made edits to FM files of project that updated successfully many times,
Forced update again, that seems to work fine, generated layout, that seemed to work fine,
But when I clicked View files, nothing happened, the dialog box silently closed.
When I clicked on the .chm file directly, MS messages says: Cannot open the file: path/file name
and nothing more. the .chm file looks to be of the correct file size.

Trys:
Updated FM files, re-imported formats for TOC, re applied conditions, turned off computer, turned it on
Fix: Threw out RoboHelp project and started a new one

New project works fine.

[Z__Bulova]

Thanks Maryann8. That is interesting. My sympathies to you! Certainly, I have been feeling the time slip away from me while I attempt to get this thing working!

In the case of these two styles, I have tried everything that you mention. This problem has persisted across projects. I believe that I have definitely isolated the problem to these two styles and it is fully reproducible.

Thanks again,

Z.

[Guest]

What do the generated topics look like after the FM-import? Are H1 elements used for the titles, or paragraph elements (P) with special styles assigned to them? Also, how do you map the FM-styles? Do you map the first chapter heading to a no. 1 heading in the CSS, the second chapter heading to a no. 2 heading in CSS etc.?

Maybe you could also experiment with the "keep FM heading styles" button in the import doialog - I do not know the exact GUI ref in English.