Context-Sensitive Help from Frame to DITA2Go (to RoboHelp)
Hello Jeremy, and Happy New Year to you!
At the end of November I took great interest in a post on frameusers.com to which you contributed greatly. The subject was "What is a "PI marker" or "programming instruction marker".
You stated that having now seen the PI syntax which Frame uses, you could add support for it to DITA2Go fairly easily, if that syntax is used consistently. I am hoping that is still the case!
Here's our situation. We have successfully created WebHelp from a ditamap using RoboHelp (with the DITA Open Toolkit in the background). However, we are planning to add Context-Sensitive Help soon and I have been unable to discover a feasible way to do that using only RoboHelp and a ditamap.
As a test, I have edited my Frame files to include the PI marker which is described in the very detailed and helpful DITA2Go User's Guide. From there I compile a .chm file using D2G, edit the .hhp file to include my map text file, import it into RoboHelp and can successfully create WebHelp with the CSH markers in tact. This is fantastic!
My next step is to see if we can do this using Frame only, and avoid having to use an editor to add the markers. From your post mentioned above, I am very hopeful that we can do this!
Our current method of creating CSH markers in Frame produces this xml within the title element:
<data datatype = "fm:marker" name = "TopicAlias" value = "WAW_0001" />
I notice that this is different than the original poster's. Perhaps this is because we have DITA-FMx installed, perhaps not. But I know that this syntax will round-trip safely. The WAW_ is a short-form for our product and could easily be changed to IDH_ if that helps. And using read/write rules we could likely change the output slightly if necessary. Perhaps you and the original poster have already worked something out.
After all that explaining, the question comes... will it be possible to create markers using FrameMaker which DITA2Go can use to create CSH HTML Help, which I can then import into RoboHelp and create the WebHelp in the same style that our customers are used to?
If you would like clarification of anything at all, please feel free to email me.
Thanks for your support of this awesome (and FREE) product!
Heather
DITA2Go accepts DITA-FMx data elements for TopicAlias
We've added support for the syntax you requested, used by DITA-FMx:
<data datatype = "fm:marker" name = "TopicAlias" value = "IDH_WWW0001" />
In addition, for normal DITA authoring, we accept the same thing without the Frame-specific @datatype:
<data name = "TopicAlias" value = "IDH_ABCD0001" />
While we were at it, we also added support for the native Structured Frame PI for TopicAlias:
<?FM MARKER [TopicAlias] IDH_about?>
We do recommend keeping the prefix "IDH_" as that is pretty standard. You can use other prefixes with DITA2Go, but you will have to specify them in [MSHtmlHelpOptions]AliasPrefix=... as they are not built-in like "IDH_" is.
The added support is in the Beta drxml004g.zip on the Basic Software download page, or at:
http://www.dita2go.com/download/drxml004g.zip
You will also need the Beta dwhtm292h.zip on the same page, or at:
http://www.dita2go.com/download/dwhtm292h.zip
Unzip both, and put the two DLLs in your %omsyshome%\common\bin,
replacing the existing ones there.