"Visibility" attribute for classes (PDF output)

[ChoccieMuffin]

I have included some comments in several topics and I have tagged the text with either a span class or a paragraph class. I want to produce a PDF where that text doesn't come out.

I tried setting "Visibility" to "hidden", and also tried "collapse", but neither of those worked for a PDF output and there was my bright red comment text plain for all to see.

Is it just that the "Visibility" attribute doesn't work in PDF output or have I completely misinterpreted how it's supposed to work? I know I could have included annotations but I didn't, so any suggestions on the best way to deal with what I currently have? I'd rather not have to mess around and make them all annotations rather than regular text with classes applied as that's real "make-work", particularly as they'll be coming out before the end of the project.

[wclass]

Try "display: none;"
I have some things hidden with this and it works for web and Word (haven't tried PDF recently).

[Craig.Prichard]

Code: Select all

.Hidden
{
	mc-heading-level: 0;
	font-family: Consolas, 'Lucida Console', 'Trebuchet MS', monospace;
	font-weight: normal;
	font-style: normal;
	font-size: 10pt;
	color: darkgreen;
	background-color: lightyellow;
	border: dashed 1px darkgreen;
	text-decoration: none;
	display: none;
}

Here is the generic class I use to keep notes to myself in context. It's butt-ugly in the editor so it will stand out but it never included in any targets. The key attribute is

Code: Select all

display: none;

[/b]

If you only want the content removed for print:

Code: Select all

@media print
{
	p.Comments, .Comments {display: none;}
}

[ChoccieMuffin]

Ah, it's "DISPLAY" and not "VISIBILITY" that I have to set! I knew there was some attribute or other that would do what I want, I just couldn't work out what it was! Thanks.

[LTinker68]

FYI, setting display to none is as if you had never entered the tag at all. Setting visibility to hidden leaves the tag and its contents in place structurally, but temporarily hides its content from view. To put it another way, assume that you have a paragraph with several lines of text followed by another paragraph. If you set the first paragraph's display to none, then the second paragraph will move up as if it were the first paragraph. If, instead, you set the first paragraph to hidden, then you'll have a block of empty space and the second paragraph will still be in its original position.

At least, I believe that's the distinction between display:none and visibility:hidden.

[NorthEast]

Here is the generic class I use to keep notes to myself in context. It's butt-ugly in the editor so it will stand out but it never included in any targets. The key attribute is

Code: Select all

display: none;

[/b]

This only works for print outputs, and would not be suitable for help outputs.

Although the text would be initially hidden when you view the topic, it will be displayed when you search for it; i.e. the hidden text will be displayed if it contains the search term.

[Craig.Prichard]

This only works for print outputs, and would not be suitable for help outputs.

Although the text would be initially hidden when you view the topic, it will be displayed when you search for it; i.e. the hidden text will be displayed if it contains the search term.

Correct. I should have also mentioned that I "conditionalize" hidden content to explicitly exclude from targets.

I guess I could simplify my workflow by eliminating the "hidden" class and letting the condition tag do it all. Thanks for getting me thinking (seldom a good idea) and consequently creating several hours of work simplifying my content.

[ChoccieMuffin]

Thank you for the continued discussion, I'm single-sourcing so I AM using the same topics in a Help. Not a problem for me as I'm going to remove all these bits of text (they're pointers during the "work in progress" stage) but very useful to know in case I happened to leave some notes in there for the future.

Can I safely assume that an annotation doesn't show up in a help? I'm just thinking ahead here as I might want to stick pointers in for future versions.

Lisa, setting visibility:hidden had NO EFFECT on the text in a PDF, which is why I raised the question.

[LTinker68]

Lisa, setting visibility:hidden had NO EFFECT on the text in a PDF, which is why I raised the question.

My guess is it's because visibility:hidden is a run-time effect. It's designed for use with scripts or mouseover effects (mouseover a picture, for example, and doing so switches another item's visibility to visible). Those differences between the two are designed more for online outputs than for print.