html help compiler crashes when building chm file

[samjones6]

Argh!

I have a Flare 6.1 project. It is a new project, imported from robohelp.

This project compiles 5 or 6 chm files, using a lot of conditional text, images, etc.

All of the chms build GREAT.... except one!

The one causes the html help compiler to crash.

How do I track down what it is choking on?

Is there a log somewhere?

Thanks!

[rob hollinger]

After you click Do or Dont send, you should be taken back to the progress dialog.
Click on the Messages tab.
The last thing listed is what was last worked on. Thats where I would start to look.

[samjones6]

Ahhh, yes.

Buried in the long stack of errors and msgs was this:

>> The specified path, file name, or both are too long.
>> The fully qualified file name must be less than 260 characters, and the directory name must be less than 248 characters.

I shortened the name of one file, and that resolved it.

Thanks!!

[RamonS]

Just for the record, that is a bug in Windows, not Flare. A limitation from the DOS days that Microsoft was unable to shed to this day.

[Madcap Guru]

Never keep long path names is the name of this story...

[samjones6]

Just for the record, that is a bug in Windows, not Flare. A limitation from the DOS days that Microsoft was unable to shed to this day.

I am well aware of it.

From our version control system, the path naming is deep....

[kashby]

I've hit this several times and it keeps coming back. The problem as it was explained to me by MadCap support is actually with Flare. Some change in last year's version of Flare affected how Flare reads in the file names for runtime merging. Rather than use the path you specify, Flare tacks on some huge path that often more than doubles the path length. I resorted to moving files to my local machine, but Flare keeps changes my 85-character path (below) to exceed 260 characters. Seems like a lot of overhead to me.

"C:\SM\v1.7.4\WebHelp_TOPAZ_Pearl_MOTW\System_Monitor_TOPAZ_Pearl_MOTW_1_7_4.mcwebhelp"