Flare 8 - Logic to open files?

[Bonnie Kern]

What is the logic that Flare 8 uses to open files?

Opening a file places it in a unique location when opened from a TOC versus the content explorer. Is there a scheme to follow that will open topics consistently?

Thank you.

[LTinker68]

I'm not sure what you mean. Are you talking about in the authoring environment or in the generated output (online output, presumably)?

[Bonnie Kern]

In the authoring environment with a user-defined window layout.

[LTinker68]

Sorry, still not getting what you mean. If I double-click on a file in the Content Explorer, the topic appears in the XML Editor (big area in the middle of the GUI). If I right-click on a link in the TOC Editor and select Open Link, the topic opens in the same place, the XML Editor.

Are you saying you see the topic open in two different areas of the Flare GUI depending on if you open it from the Content Explorer or from the TOC Editor?

Or are you talking about when you create a topic file? I generally create the topic file in the Content Explorer so I can control where the file exists in my folder structure, then I drag the file to the appropriate place in the TOC Editor. If you create the topic from the TOC Editor, then it will add the topic to the root of the Content Explorer, because it doesn't know where else to put the file. That is, the structure of your topics in the TOC Editor has nothing to do with the file structure in the Content Explorer. You can make them almost identical, but they're not co-dependent, so changing one doesn't change the other.

[Bonnie Kern]

It's a window layout oddity. When I define my own layout, Flare's behavior to open files is not consistent.

For example:

After floating topics and a TOC and arranging them in the window layout, Flare might place the next topic to be opened in its own space or it might dock it with a group of topics docked together. Sometimes Flare will open topics in their own panes juxtaposed with the other panes. This behavior also appears when opening a file from the content explorer versus opening it from a TOC.

When floating and arranging topics, or closing files, sometimes a blank area appears between the windows. Flare might open the next topic in this blank space, but at other times it doesn't. When clicking and dragging a pane to resize it, sometimes the resized pane overruns another pane and hides it.

Flare 8 is a fabulous tool. It would be useful to know the tricks to avoid these oddities.

[LTinker68]

Other users have mentioned bugs when customizing the layout. I can't remember if this is one of the problems that have been mentioned, but it's probably related to the other issues already raised. That said, make sure you submit a bug report at http://www.madcapsoftware.com/bugs/submit.aspx.

[Bonnie Kern]

Awesome, thanks.