Problem linking TOC topics

[ccardimon]

I am trying to follow this procedure:

To link a TOC entry or book to an existing topic.

Select the TOC entry or book.
In the local toolbar of the TOC Editor, click . The Properties dialog opens.
Click Select Topic. The Open File dialog opens, displaying all the topics in your project.
Select the topic to which you want to link the entry and click Open.
In the Properties dialog, click OK. The entry is now linked to the topic.

Everything works until I get to the "click Open" part. The topics I want to open and link -- won't.
I am trying to do this with a project I imported from RoboHelp.
Any hints, tips, or suggestions would be appreciated.

[KevinDAmery]

They won't open or you can't find them? If you can't find them, it may be the location of the files. Flare defaults to putting topics in the Content folder, but RH didn't. When it imports RH projects, I don't think Flare moves them into Content, so the topics may not be where the link dialog thinks things should be.

[ccardimon]

I can find them, but they won't open. I don't understand this. The main topics won't open and neither will the individual pages. It's like RH topics and pages are not recognized by Flare, or something like that.

[LTinker68]

Does it give you an error when you try to open them? Can you view those pages in a regular web browser?

[ccardimon]

Does it give you an error when you try to open them? Can you view those pages in a regular web browser?

I do not get an error when I try to open them. They simply won't open. When I click on the page, the page won't appear in the FIle Name box. Yes, I can view the pages in a regular web browser.

[LTinker68]

Are you trying to open the topic from the TOC Editor after you've linked it to a book or topic?

If you're trying to open a topic by clicking on the TOC entry, then it doesn't work, unless you hold the Ctrl (?) key down when you click on the TOC entry. (Sorry, I don't have Flare open at the moment, so I don't remember the correct sequence.) I believe you can also right-click on the TOC entry and select something like "open link". Double-clicking on the TOC entry just opens the properties for that TOC entry, not the topic it's pointing to.

[ccardimon]

I was originally trying to get rid of the red marks that mean I have unlinked items in the TOC.

I was following the instructions for linking TOC items, but I can't seem to get those directions to work.

I must be missing something.

[KevinDAmery]

Are you only having this problem with the RH imported topics, or with all topics? If it's just the RH content, there may be an issue with the topics themselves. (Can't imagine what, but ya never know....) I'd check those topics for things like the extension (htm vs. html) and any code that might be in the Head section of the topics.

If it's happening for every topic, could you tell us exactly what steps you're using? If you are missing a step or performing it incorrectly, hopefully one of us can spot what it is.

[ccardimon]

What extension should they have? I never paid any attention to that. Updating the material was quite enough at the time.

[KevinDAmery]

What extension should they have? I never paid any attention to that. Updating the material was quite enough at the time.

Flare normally creates .htm files. AFAIK, files with the .html extension should also work, but it's always possible there may be a bug in that area.

[ccardimon]

I checked the extensions and they are all, indeed, htm. Maybe something else is going on.

[LTinker68]

Can you drag one of those topics from the Content Explorer into the TOC Editor? That's how I normally add topics to the TOC. Does that work?

[ccardimon]

Are you only having this problem with the RH imported topics, or with all topics?

Almost all topics are imported from RH. The short topics are imported from Word and have no TOCs.

If it's happening for every topic, could you tell us exactly what steps you're using? If you are missing a step or performing it incorrectly, hopefully one of us can spot what it is.

All right. Here we go. I'm in Project Organizer. I click TOCs. I double-click Primary (Master). On the right side, I click the plus sign in the Primary tab to expand my user guide, which has a red icon next to it. When I mouse over the red thing, it says "(Unlinked item)"

When the user guide expands, I see the topics I expect to see, but they all have the red icons next to them. This is what I see:

This is what I see.png

I right-click on any red icon and get this menu:

red icon menu.png

I select "Link to Topic" and, after further clicking, get this menu:

Open File2.png

No matter what I select or click from here on, nothing at all appears in the File Name box.

Any suggestions would be most appreciated.

[LTinker68]

Yeah, that's a bug. I just did a quick test, and you're right -- when you left-click on a file, its name doesn't appear in the File Name field. But, if you select the file then click Open, it will indeed create the link to that topic. So you can link topics using this method, just realize that the File Name field won't populate.

Make sure you submit a bug report to http://www.madcapsoftware.com/bugs/submit.aspx.

[ccardimon]

Can you drag one of those topics from the Content Explorer into the TOC Editor? That's how I normally add topics to the TOC. Does that work?

Interesting. This method seems to be working. Flare does not seem to like linking the imported TOC topics, but it will link the clicked and dragged topics.

[ccardimon]

Yeah, that's a bug. I just did a quick test, and you're right -- when you left-click on a file, its name doesn't appear in the File Name field. But, if you select the file then click Open, it will indeed create the link to that topic. So you can link topics using this method, just realize that the File Name field won't populate.

Make sure you submit a bug report to http://www.madcapsoftware.com/bugs/submit.aspx.

Done.