MadCap Software Forums

I am producing a document that will be output of both PDF and WebHelp. The TOC for:
1. PDF: automatically itimises h1, h2 and h3 headings I have in each topic and applies an offset for the different levels.
2. WebHelp: only displays the items in the TOC file.
I do not want to create a separate topic for each of the h2 and h3 items in the topic, but I still want a similar looking TOC for the WebHelp.
I have achieved something very similar by creating bookmarks and linking them to books in the TOC, but this is a very laborious task.
Can anyone help me. please?

If you want your print output to look like your WebHelp TOC, then in the Targets on the Printed output select Use TOC depth for Heading Levels.

I think he/she is asking for it the other way around.

You don't need to put bookmarks in the topics -- Flare (v4 at least) will do it for you automatically. Create the TOC entry from scratch in the TOC Editor. Link it to a topic then click "Select Bookmark" (even if you didn't put any bookmarks in the topic). A screen will appear listing the headings (h1, h2, h3, etc.) found in the destination file. Select the heading you want then click Ok, and the destination link will appear with #HeadingTitle at the end, where #HeadingTitle is the bookmark identifier that Flare added. When you clicked "Select Bookmark", the destination file was opened in the XML Editor, and when you select a heading, it adds the bookmark, so you'll need to save that topic.

You can also do the same thing to a topic that you dragged to the TOC Editor to make the TOC entry -- just modify the TOC entry and select the heading.

So you'll still end up with bookmarks, but it's easier than going through each topic one at a time to add them -- just do it when you add the topic to the TOC.

Awesome tip, Lisa. I was playing around with mini TOCs as a possible solution to recommend, but they do the opposite of what the OP is asking. On the bright side, now I not only understand how to use your bookmark solution, but I also have a much better grasp of mini TOCs!

Yeah, along with what Lisa said,

There is no way to dynamically create the TOC from the topics for WebHelp. The WebHelp TOC will only display the items you add to the TOC using the TOC editor. So, if you want your WebHelp TOC to include Level 2/3/x headings in your topic file, then you need to manually add each one to the TOC.

If you do this, be sure to add the "online" condition to the redundant topics, or they will be included multiple times in your printed output.

Oh, and also, be sure to exclude the "online" condition from your printed target.

Lisa and Paul
Thank you very much. It is certainly easier than using bookmarks!
Cheers
Erika