Style Mapping for TOC & Drop-down

[LarryTX]

I'm using RoboHelp 8 and MS Word 2007. I've modified the Style Mapping.dot Word template in the project folder (as opposed to the generic one in the RoboHelp installation folder). I've done the mapping in the Printed Document Appearance dialog box. The problem is that RoboHelp seems to totally ignore or override the styles in the template. I hope that someone can tell me what I'm doing wrong. Let me list some of the problems:

• In the table of contents, the top-level entries are numbered. Within RoboHelp, the Heading 1 entries are not numbered, and the comparable style, TOC1, in the Word Template is not numbered. Yet in the output, the entries are numbered. I don't want them numbered.
• The Word output for "dropspot" text is indented by 1/2", and the output for "droptext" is indented by 1". Both are encased in <p> tags in the RoboHelp source, and the style for div.droptext in the default.css does not contain a left-margin rule. In the Word template, the mapped paragraph style for the droptext does not contain an indent. Of course the style information for dropspot on both the RoboHelp and Word sides is a character format and can't contain any left-margin/indent information. Just for grins, I tried changing the color for dropspot and droptext in the style sheet; that change was produced in the output, but nothing that I have been able to do eliminates the indentation.
• The Word output for the droptext is bolded. Again, it is not bolded in the RoboHelp source, defalut.css, nor in the Word template style mapped to it.

In the case of the TOC problem, RoboHelp seems to add the numbering to the TOC1 style even though it is not in Style Mapping.dot. Fixing is fairly simple by just altering the style in the output.

In the case of the dropspot/droptext entries, the problem is monumental. RoboHelp does not appear to add the indentation information to the Word style sheet. Instead, it appears ot modify every single instance inline. Beccause the Help system in question consists of a very large volume of drop-down entries and because it must exist in both online and printed versions, it virtually requires the maintenance of two entirely separate "documents." Since the source can change frequently and substantially, that becomes extraordinarily expensive in terms of resources. We really need to be able to generate useful printed documentation from the online source. Any suggestions.

[Peter Grainge]

I just created a new project and set it up to map to the Style Mapping template. That is obviously a new copy taken from the installation folder.

I opened the template in Word and used the Change Style pod (CTRL + SHIFT + ALT + S). There I removed numbering from the TOC style. When I generated a document, there was no numbering.

Dropspots can be part of a paragraph so there should be no indenting. In this sentence "part of a paragraph" could be a dropspot so indenting would be a nonsense.

Using the supplied template neither were indented.

That all suggests to me that a fresh look at your in project template needs another review.

---

See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips

@petergrainge