Best Way to Convert Over to Flare

This forum is for all Flare issues related to the Microsoft HTML Help target.
This target produces "CHM" files in the output.
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ccfisher76
Propeller Head
Posts: 12
Joined: Thu Aug 31, 2017 7:43 am

Best Way to Convert Over to Flare

Post by ccfisher76 »

I have been searching this forum but could not find my answer, so I thought I would ask it myself.

We are new to Flare (greetings everyone!). We build our help two ways: 1) CHM files (over 300 of them) and (2) a searchable website. We have been using Help&Manual, which we love, but we see the more powerful options in Flare and are ready to convert.

We have many conditional topics (and even phrases) for the CHM builds and web builds, context-sensitive help used with an <F1> key, and external jumps between help projects.

My question is: When you came to this point of conversion, did you find it was easiest to take the CHM file and convert it into a Flare project, or would it be easier to take the html files built from H&M and use those to convert into the Flare project? Flare does not have the option of taking a Help&Manual project (similar to a flprj) and using that to convert.

So far we've been converting the CHM's, which is pretty slick and retains all the keywords we need to build our context-sensitive help. But there is a lot of cleanup, as each topic retains all the styling from the CHM skin we built in H&M.

Any thoughts/experiences?
ChoccieMuffin
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Location: Surrey, UK

Re: Best Way to Convert Over to Flare

Post by ChoccieMuffin »

As you're a new user and and have probably only recently purchased Flare, my first suggestion would be to speak to the Sales team at MadCap. They will be able to speak to the techies and should be able to help (if you don't get exactly what you need from the other forum members, of course).
Started as a newbie with Flare 6.1, now using Flare 2023.
Report bugs at http://www.madcapsoftware.com/bugs/submit.aspx.
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devjoe
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Re: Best Way to Convert Over to Flare

Post by devjoe »

Definite speak with MadCap. I haven't worked with Help&Manual, so I don't know how well Flare supports importing its source. When we imported stuff from RoboHelp a few years ago, the HTML projects imported as source with pretty much everything supported including conditions. Some ancient projects were still in Word source though, and nothing else wanted to touch that including Flare. We ended up importing the CHM files for those and reapplying whatever wasn't preserved in the process.
SKamprowski
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Location: Germany

Re: Best Way to Convert Over to Flare

Post by SKamprowski »

Hi,

I suggest not to import the chms, but start with their source files .hhp etc. In order to get this in H&M you may need to recompile your H&M project with the option "Delete temporary files" unchecked. If you choose to create a chm without a skin this will also help to reduce cleanup work in Flare.
Kind regards,
Sabine Kamprowski
DocToHelp MVP (by ComponentOne)
ccfisher76
Propeller Head
Posts: 12
Joined: Thu Aug 31, 2017 7:43 am

Re: Best Way to Convert Over to Flare

Post by ccfisher76 »

I hadn't thought of publishing without a skin. I'll try this out. Thanks!
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