Using hyperlinks in globally linked project

[joanTravis]

I've set up a project using the global linking feature with a parent and two child projects. In each child project, I import the shared files from the parent. Linking works as I expected in the child projects. (In a child project, when I want to refer to a topic that's in the parent project, I can insert a cross-reference and choose the desired topic because it appears in my child project as a link.)

But, how do I refer to a topic that's located in my child project from the parent? Since the child projects appear only in the TOC as links, I can't use a cross-reference.

One thought was to, in my parent project, import the desired topics from the child projects. This way, they'd appear to be in the parent project (as links). Is this appropriate use of global linking? Importing parent from child and child to parent? I was thinking that I'd only want to import in one direction.

Another thought was to use external hyperlinks, but I don't want to use full URLs because I'm hosting the help on a server.

Can anyone set me on the right path?

[Cecily]

I don't think there's anything technical to stop you importing from child to parent. However, in all but the smallest projects, that could get very confusing.

Could you have all the shared topics in the parent, but for the ones that will only appear in the child, just not include them in the parent target (omit from TOC and use conditions to ensure they're not searchable)?