How to launch online help from another server?

[dwc3]

I'm running RoboHelp 10.

Our company is going to be supplying client software packages that need to be small, and since the online help is about 75 MB, they request that customers be able to access the online help remotely -- located on a server machine. In this way, customers aren't required to install the online doc files on their client machine, yet need to still be able to open help topics (located on a server machine elsewhere).

Is this possible? How are online help topics opened when the help is on another machine?

Development has tried calling the help from a http address, e.g., http://localhost:port/cldocs/cloverleaf.htm#<id=159>>java=true, but that doesn't work. ("cloverleaf.htm" opens the online help).

dan

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

Server as in LAN server? Sure, that’s possible – it’s what I use for one of my product lines. I have WebHelp installed on a client’s LAN server in a folder on a shared drive. They use their browser to launch both CSH help topics via MapIDs and the full help via the index page from within our software. You just have to keep in mind that even though it’s located on a server & not a workstation, browsers all consider it to be “local” HTML pages and they can slap security restrictions on it. If you haven’t got your RH10 all patched up and tweaked to handle browser security issues, you’re going to have malfunctioning help via the browser.

[prhmusic2]

Very true! One of the security issues I had to deal with (years ago) was the Mark of the Web (MOTW). There is an option to add it to WebHelp and/or FlashHelp output.

[Captiv8r]

Paul, are you saying you needed to ENABLE MOTW to make things work? Or are you saying it was enabled and disabling made things work?

Or something else entirely?

Cheers... Rick

[prhmusic2]

Years ago, when I distributed WebHelp, it was installed on the user’s c:\ drive. With that help system, I distributed ~200 PDFs. The issue was because I couldn’t add MOTW to the PDF file, I had to create an HTML for each PDF file and, within the HTML file, include the MOTW line. I think there was a script that a co-worker created to automatically generate the HTML files for me – the details are fuzzy.

The only reason I replied is because MOTW was an example of the possible technical issues that Jeff alluded to and that there is a check box in the RH UI to resolve that specific issue.

[Captiv8r]

Ahhh, now that you mention it, I do recall your having issues surrounding that.

Thanks for the review!

Cheers... Rick

[dwc3]

Well, MOTW is enabled (always has been), and that doesn't seem to help.

On the software, users can click either "Help" to open the online help at the overall table of contents, or "Help Topics" to open the online help the page (mapID) specific to the current GUI selection.

I'm not sure of the responses above, though. Having MOTW checked hasn't helped. Is it just a matter of how the help is called from within the client's machine? There needs to be something in the client software that can call the help from the remote server machine, without any machinations from the customer.

Seems like there'd need to be at least an http for the server machine (containing the online help files) from which the client machine can access the help. Beyond, that, though, I'm lost.

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

From what I recall, MOTW doesn't have much to do with things on newer versions of IE and Edge - you need to be producing your WebHelp with either a hand-patched version of RH10 or move up to RH2015 to get the fixes baked in. Adobe isn't spending much time doing patches for a version 2 behind the current one these days.

As far as calling the help - when you're on a client workstation, can you browse to the LAN server & find the index page of the WebHelp on that LAN server? If so, then that's your call to launch the "main" help with TOC exposed. As far as the CSH launching, what flavour of CSH launching are you using now? There's a number of different methods that come packaged with RH - C#, .NET, VB, etc.

[dwc3]

This is a question for the developers, which I've relayed to them.

All I know on that, so far, is what they've told me is currently being done, where they call the help from a http address, e.g., http://localhost:port/cldocs/cloverleaf.htm#<id=159>>java=true, but that doesn't work.

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

If you strip off the stuff after “cloverleaf.htm” does that open in your browser?