RoboHelp's Search Function

It would help me in connection with some work I am doing, to
know what people like and dislike about the way the search function
works in webhelp (standard webhelp, not webhelp pro).
Please cover things you would like to see as well. Google
like results for example.

The ability to tag topics (in the GUI) with META-keywords
which, when entered by the user, would display in a separate panel
called "Sponsored links" or "Recommended links" at the top (and/or
in a right-side column?). Then, of course, I would want the ability
to produce a report, or even have another column in the Topics pane
called Search Keywords (right clicking on "Yes" would list the
keywords for that topic).
The ability to assign categories to groups (by folder and/or
file names, with wildcard option), and allow the user to choose
from all or selected categories.
Is this sounding familiar, Peter?
Oh, and all three options for searching on multiples: any
words, all words, as a phrase.
Naturally, this would have to work equally well in a merged
project as in a standalone project!

Similar Messages

RoboHelp 6 Search Function Finds Deleted Topics

When I delete a topic from the TOC panel in RoboHelp 6, it correctly disappears from the TOC and is not included in the TOC when I generate WebHelp output. So far, so good.
However, if you click on the "Search" tab in the generated WebHelp output and happen to search for a term within the deleted topic, the deleted topic still opens.
How do I prevent this?
Thanks

Hi there
Is it out of the question to upgrade your RoboHelp?
I ask because I don't believe the option Jeff menitoned is available to you in version 6. This version is getting long in the tooth as it was released in 2007. In the recent versions we now have at least two different ways to make content hidden from search.
Is the topic in question actually referenced in other ways? Or is your goal to just make it unfindable?
More info is needed in order to help you plan a course of action.
Cheers... Rick

RoboHelp 8 vs. 9 - Search Functionality Comparison and "All of the Words" vs. "Any of the Words"

Greetings!
Our organization focuses a lot on the accuracy of our searches, which is a necessity when we have hundreds of very lengthy topics (no matter how well organized they are).
I finally completed a detailed comparison of the search functionality of 8 and 9 and came to the realization that 8 is a disaster, while with 9 things get better, but there's still TONS of room for improvement. I have reported this to Adobe and so far there has been no official response. There are many blogs on here related to the search functionality, but I thought it may be a good idea to try to sum some of them up. I do hope that someone somewhere at Adobe runs into this and shares with all of us why Adobe's Search functionality is still in the 20th century!
I hope this helps everyone else who is curious to know about how the tool's search functions work and whether it's worth upgrading from 8 to 9 at this point. I have included some examples which are in a way internal to us, but they will give you a good idea of what to expect and I'm quite confident you'll be able to recreate them on your side in seconds.
I also wanted to ask a question or two, and if anyone can assist, that would be greatly appreciated:
Currently if we search for several words at once (not exact phrase), both 8 and 9 perform an "Any of the words" search which always returns too many results. Does anyone know a way to change the default to an "All of the words" search? For years I have not encountered a tool out there that doesn't have the option to modify this, alas with RoboHelp 8 and 9, we can't find a way to do it (with or without modifying the source code).
Out of curiosity, are there any other tools out there which offer Conditional Tag (or similar) functionality and which behave better than RoboHelp? (easier to maintain, less buggy, web interface, etc)?
RoboHelp 8 vs 9 - Search Functionality Comparison Table with some Examples:
Search Example
RoboHelp 8
RoboHelp 9
Expected Results
(based on industry standards)
1. Searching for Exact Phrase "Correspondent Banking"
Such a search returns topics which contain "Correspondent Banking" and "Correspondent Bank". The last one is included because "Bank" is the root of "Banking". The topics that contain the exact phrase appear at the bottom. When we click on any of them, we're not automatically taken to phrase so we have to scroll and look for it or use CTR+F.
Identical behavior except that when we click on the topics which contain the exact phrase, we're taken straight to it.
When we hear "exact" we expect "exact" and nothing else. Unfortunately, both versions keep searching for the roots of each word as well and incorrectly display those results at the top. Adobe has made it clear that this is a part of their functionality, BUT this is something we would not expect to see for exact phrase searches that are in quotes.
2. A Non-Exact phrase search of "Geographical Limits of market area"
The tool automatically performs an "Any of the Words" search instead of an "All of the Words" search. This is also related to the question I asked above this table. As you can imagine, this is returning almost every topic and it becomes virtually impossible to find what we're looking for. It even returns topics which contain "of" and nothing else.
Identical behavior
There to be an option which allows us to choose what the default search would be - "Any of the words" vs. "All of the Words"
3. Exact Phrase search of "low-score" with a dash
None of the topics that were returned contain the phrase. As some of you know, RH8 has problems with special characters, including dashes.
RH9 returned only the topic that which contains the phrase and we were taken straight to it when we open it.
The expectation is to see exactly what RH9 currently offers. Unfortunately 8 has a big problem with these types of searches.
4. Exact Phrase search of "2.4"
This is similar to the one above. Adobe doesn't like periods as well. It doesn't not find any of the topics which contain this phrase. In our case, this is a section number and sometimes people want a quick way to get to a specific section or sub-section.
We were hoping that this will be fixed with 9, just the way they fixed the dashes. Unfortunately, still ZERO results returned.
Expectation is for the topics which contain that exact phrase to be returned, no matter whether there's any special character inbetween.
5. Exact Phrase search of "300,000" or $300,000"
The tool only returned several random topics which contain "000" as part of larger numbers. The topic that contains "300,000" was not on that list, even though it also contains "000".
Identical behavior
Expectation is for topics that contain the exact amount to be returned, no matter if there is a coma or a dollar sign anywhere within the phrase.
6. Exact Phrase Search of "525-B5". Goal was to have a special character, a letter and numbers.
ZERO Results returned.
Only the docs that contain the phrase were returned and nothing else. It seems that this this was addressed in version 9 and now it behaves as expected.
Expectation is only for the docs that contain the exact phrase to be returned.
7. Exact phase search of "log" in order to test the Substring Functionality
Here's an extract from Adobe's Support Site:
“Substring search (WebHelp/Pro, FlashHelp/Pro) - If you enable this feature, a search for "log" returns topics containing the words "catalog" and "logarithm." Substring search takes longer than whole-string search.”
So with that in mind, we decided to test if turning the substring searches on and off does exactly as advertised, unfortunately the answer was NO. We even used an example almost idnetical to what Adobe provided on their site.
With Substring Searches disabled, we searched for the word "log". Unfortunately it returned words like "logbook" and methodology". How is that possible?
Identical behavior
Our expectation would be only for docs that contain"log" to be returned, no matter whether substring is enabled or disabled. In our case it was disabled.

Hi there
Out of curiosity, why is it that you expect to hear from Adobe? I'm hoping it's not simply because you posted here. Certainly we have Adobe folks that visit here and we are thankful for that, but it isn't to be expected.
Cheers... Rick
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Does RoboHelp 11 have the ability to add filters for the search function?

Does Robohelp 11 have the ability to add filters for the search function?

There's a page on my site about ZoomSearch. You can set up Rh to work with that and have a page with links or buttons that bring up different search options.
See www.grainge.org for RoboHelp and Authoring tips
@petergrainge

Crash on search function for HTML Help file (.chm) when connected to a Visual C++ application

Crash on search function for HTML Help file (.chm) when
connected to a Visual C++ application
I use the RH_ShowHelp API command to connect a HTML Help file
(.chm file generated by RoboHelp Word X 5) to my Visual C++
application. My application is able to call up this HTML help file
in context-sensitive mode and everything is working great in the
Contents and Index panels EXCEPT when I click on List Topics (after
I enter a KEYWORD for search) in the Search panel.
I got an error that said “Unhandled exception in
xxxx.exe.(HHCTRL.OCX):0xC00000FD: Stack overflow”
I am able to execute this .chm file by itself and the search
function works well in this case. I am using HHActiveX.dll that is
created on 2/23/04. Is this the correct version?? Any advice what
to do here??

Hi agschin and welcome to the RH forums. The hhactivex.dll
file is not used by the search function so you can rule that our.
Have you tried recompiling and seeing if the problem still happens?
You can also start the Bug Hunter feature in RH - View > Output
View and then select the Bug Hunter button - and see if that throws
up any clues.

Search functionality no longer works in any of my recently generated HTML Help projects

I'm using Rh 10.0.1.292 and Rh 11.0.4.291 for different projects.
Recently, I've noticed that the Search feature returns no results, in any of my projects that are generated in either Rh10 or 11. I just get the "No topics found" message. This used to work.
The only thing that has been done recently (that I can think of) involved working with .slp files to fix an issue with the Glossary tab and the Search functionality in a Rh 11 Responsive HTML5 layout. (https://forums.adobe.com/thread/1690579) I can't, however, see how that would break the Search functionality in my HTML projects.
Any ideas?

In either Rh 10 and 11, whenever I generated a project as HTML Help (even an example project) the Search functionality was broken. Finally, when I couldn't think of what else to try, I uninstalled and reinstalled Rh 10, and that solved my problem--in both Rh 10 and 11!
Apparently some file was corrupted, but I don't know what was broken or what caused the corruption. I am still trying to get some clarification from Adobe, but so far, I have only received the following comments:
The robohelp cache folder and the preferences might have caused this.
The problem can be either with the updates on system.
If I should receive any definitive information, I will update this post.
Thanks.

PDF files are very faint and the search function doesn't highlight the search term when found

I'm using Firefox 5 with Windows 7 64 bit. When I open a PDF file the file is very faint and the search function doesn't highlight the search term in the body of the PDF.

Dear Peter,
I met the following problem, and please help me.
My English (not Chinese) operating system: Windows XP
Version: 2002
Before using RoboHelp 7 to generate Webhelp, I perform the
following steps:
1. Control Panel->Regional Options
2. On the "Languages" page make sure make sure you check the
box "Install files for East Asian languages".
3. On the "Advanced" page select "Chinese" from the language
dropdown list.
Then I perform the following steps:
1. Use RoboHelp 7 to generate Webhelp (my Webhelp project
contains localized Chinese files).
2. In the "Search" tab, input a Chinese character(For example
"连接") and perform a seach.
Result: Serching...(or 正在搜索) or
No topics found (or
未找到主题)。
Expected result: I can get the result.
Text

Stack overflow at line: 1792 or 1788 when using the search function

Hello everyone,
My name is Thibault. I am a technical communications specialist. I've been using Robohelp html for a couple of years.
I am working on the user guide of the software application developed where I work.
This is a HUGE project, more than 6500 pages.
We're two technical writers on this project. (This is an inportant detail since my colleague doesn't get the problem).
I need your help because I have been having an annoying issue over the last couple of days.
After the project is generated, I open it in the software, clicking F1.
When I want to use the search function I have this error message displayed:
"Stack overflow at line: 1792" or "Stack overflow at line: 1788"
Do you know where this could come from?
Furthermore, I noticed that this stack overflow only occurs on some words.
I mean, it occurs for the most used words in this project.
We have customers all over the world and over the last week, we've been getting a lot of feedbacks about this error message.
I hope someone will be able to help me on this one!
Thanks in advance!

First of all, thanks for your answer RoboColum(n).
Is the problem only when you search for a topic that contains Flash output?
All my topics contain Flash outputs. I generate my output files on a folder that is embedded into the software.When in the software, I click F1 and the Flash User Guide opens.The search function works (or not) depending on the software version (32/64-bit).
At what point exactly does the stack overview occur?
We have two versions of the software a 32-bit version and a 64-bit version.
The search function works fine with the 32-bit version.
The problem occurs when I use the 64-bit version. When I type in a word, for example "unit", the stack overflow message appears. See below:
As you can see, it looks like the search function freezes while the stack overflow message appears.
And I never get this error message with the 32-bit version of our software.
I also wonder whether you can search on a project that contains no Flash output. Perhaps you could try for us?
What do you mean by that?
As I told you previously, my Flash Player version is a 32-bit one.
Do you think that the issue might come from there?

Fix for WebHelp output issues with IE 11 breaks Search function

I use RoboHelp HTML 9 and have been having issues with generated WebHelp in IE 11. The TOC was totally blank and the Search tab looked fine but did not function. Everything worked fine in Firefox. After much experimenting and online research in these forums and elsewhere, I have been able to get the TOC to display properly in IE 11 (and Firefox) but the fix has caused the Search tab to stop functioning as per this other forum post RH9 Webhelp Search function is not working properly.
I need to have BOTH TOC and Search displayed and functioning properly but in order to get the TOC displayed properly I had to change the Preferred Format setting to "Pure HTML" and, according to the post mentioned above, that is what messes up the Search function. Is there a solution that will allow both TOC and Search to function properly?
Here is a summary of the steps I have taken to get to this point:
Tested WebHelp output from two different projects of my own as well as the Salesbuilder starter project - all would display/function properly in Firefox but not in IE 11 (blank TOC and non-functioning Search).
Found a "patch" for RH10 for the exact problem I was having with RH9 but was not able to find a version for RH9. Since the patch included 2 files (whutils.js and whver.js) only, I backed up these files in the RoboHTML\WebHelp5Ext\template_stock directory and replaced them with the new ones.
Regenerated one of my RoboHelp projects - still didn't work in IE 11 and now didn't work in Firefox either!
Tried turning on Mark of the Web but this did not help and would not allow opening PDF's which is necessary to one of the projects so I turned it off again.
Changed Preferred Format setting to "Pure HTML" instead of "DHTML" and the TOC displayed and functioned properly in IE 11 and Firefox! Hurray!!
Celebrated for 10 seconds until I clicked on Search tab and saw the input box filled with letters of the alphabet with other random letters, words, numbers below. It looks almost like an index but neither of my projects uses an index and I have not generated one in either project.
Found the post mentioned above which states that the solution is to change the Preferred Format setting back to DHTML but when I do that I am back to blank TOC and proper-looking but non-functioning Search!!!
I have now removed the Search tab from the output of one of the projects since it is not really necessary but I need to find a fix for this for my other project.
Both of my projects are run locally - one is release documentation that is distributed on a CD and the other is CSH which is loaded on the local server with the software for which it was created.
Dorothy
Note to Administrators: Sorry, but I originally posted this as a reply to a previous post - Contents, Index, & Search do not display in generated help... - so perhaps it should be removed from that thread to avoid confusion.

The "preliminary" fix provided has worked perfectly! All versions of my WebHelp project now display TOC properly and I was able to change the Preferred Format setting back to DHTML so the Search tab both displays and functions as it should. I am very grateful to William for providing this fix which works in both IE 11 and Firefox. Someday I will pursue the fixes to make it work in Chrome as well.

Chm search function issue in Japanese windows 7/XP Operation System

search function does not work in Japanese windows 7/XP Operation System

Sorry, I really don't what the meaning of "Does the file launch? Is it on a network drive?"..
You know, I create a project file(all contents in every page is english) by using Robohelp 10, then I generate Microsoft HTML Help(chm), during generating,popup a dialog window which says “Html Help settings has unsupported characters for the choosen language. Do you want to continue?”,I choose "yes", It will continue to generate,
1.After finishing generating, I open this chm document, the search function is OK in Window7 Chinese/English Operation system(32bit/64bit);
2.Then I send it(chm) to some Japanese who use window vista/7 Japanese Operation system, the search function is not work

IPhone 5s Voice memo to mp3. Now music on iPhone. Won't play from search function.

I record my band rehearsals using the voice memo on my iPhone 5s. Then I sync to iTunes and convert file to mp3. When i sync back to my iPhone it appears in my music. So far, so good. When I use the search function in music it finds the file but won't play from tapping. I must troll through all my music songs (currently 2227 of them) to find it and then play it. Is it something to do with it still being under the genre "voice memos" or what ? Anybody help please. Thanks

iWeb is an application to create webpages with.
It used to be part of the iLife suite of applications.
iWeb has no knowledge of the internal speaker on your iPhone.
You may want to ask in the right forum.

How do I use the new search function for ipod?

itunes 7.0 and ipod is up to date:
when i scroll through the music, i get the nifty little grey box with the letter in it, but how do i get to the search where i use the click wheel to input a query and search through all items in my ipod?

Unless your iPod is one of the recently announced upgraded 30GB or 80GB iPods, you don't have the search function. It was not added to existing devices in the recent update. It may or may not be added in some future software update but there's no official word on that.

Search function in Help not working in any application

The Search function is not working in any application's Help. Upon entering the terms I need help for I get a hang at "Searching..." but never any result. This problem started sometime in the last year or so. Prior to that the search function in Help worked fine. My network connectivity is excellent.
I recently reinstalled OS X 10.5 but I'm sure the problem existed before that and persisted after the reinstall.
The reinstall was due to upgrading to 10.7 and only then finding that I had lost needed functionality, but I don't think this has anything to do with the current problem. All other aspects of Help seem to be working fine
I don't find any reference to this problem anywhere so I'm hoping someone can help with my Help(!) problem. Thanks in advance.

Try running your Leopard install disk again, as well as the 10.5.8 combo updater. This might reinstall any 'missing bits'.
You can do this without deleting the hard drive, just install straight over your existing system, but close all applications and external devices first.
Or you could also do this via an Archive and Instal:
How to Archive & Install:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1710
and this also:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2196?viewlocale=en_US
This document explains how to correctly reinstall a prior version of Mac OS X in the event that other troubleshooting does not resolve an issue:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=25404
BUT: Don't install older versions of Mac OS than what came with your computer:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2186?viewlocale=en_US

RH9 Webhelp Search function is not working properly

Hi,
My organization is using RH9 for a Webhelp project. My company and our client are restricted to using IE9 for the online help I have created for this project, and our OS environment is Windows 7. When I generate using the Webhelp layout, with the TOC, Index and Search options chosen, my resulting browser window shows two frames. Left for the Contents/Index/Search and right for the content. In the left panel, there are three links at the top for Contents, Index and Search. When I click on the Search link, the only thing I see is the alphabet A-Z (which are links to filter items beginning with these letters (much like the index link) and a list of what I would say is garbage. For example, if I click on H, I see items like "half 1 2 3" or "held" or "honor # 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8", etc. If I run my cursor down this list, I notice that maybe the word honor is a link. If clicked it brings up one of my topic pages. I can also click on the random numbers that appear, like clicking on 3 it brings up another topic page. The search function does not allow me to type in a search criteria, since there is no search field as well.
Do you have any suggestions for this issue? Is this a bug, or do I need to change settings somewhere within RH9? The same thing is happening when using this help project that is running on our clients server. Is there any suggestion you can give to try and make this work properly?

Rick, Thanks for stepping in. I assumed that was the reason why I was not receiving the search field, and that is fine for now. We have discussed with our client the possibility of having two different help projects one for each, but that decision was kind of put on the back burner.
However, the other issue I am having is still there and I don't quite understand why. Since I only have clickable A-Zs for the search, and it lists links much like the Index section, I'm still seeing lists of just numbers and characters (i.e., "# 1 2 3 4 5", or "%" or "& 1 2 3 4 5" sometimes all the way up to 18 or so). And each of these characters or numbers are clickable links as well to either page that doesn't contain that number or to nothing.
Doing a bit more research, I have noticed that a lot of these links are being picked up by the PDF file we have as part of the project. Our help project has a link to the documented version of the help in the form of a User Guide.pdf file. So the search is listing items from that guide like the heading numbers 1.0, 1.0.1, etc. Also each of these are clickable links that go nowhere. But then there is still the numbers 1, 2, etc that go to pages that don't have this anywhere on the page.
Do you have any insight as to why these types of things are being listed under Search at all? They make that selection look very messy and unorganized. Not professional at all. I have checked and tested the properties settings and can't seem to find what is causing this to happen. Any idea would be most appreciated!!

When I 'Tab Groups,' the search function immediately pops up (and it won't go away) every time, preventing me from accessing my grouped tabs. How can I prevent this from happening?

Using Firefox 5.0 with Windows 7 on a laptop, whenever I click the 'Group Tabs' icon to the right of my tabs, the search function immediately comes up over my grouped tabs, preventing me from using any of them. When the search function comes up, the screen goes semi-dark and the search bar appears - any text I type at this time is entered into the search bar (the search function works normally). If I click any section of the screen at this time the search function disappears and the screen regains color - but only for a fraction of a second, and then the search function comes up again, along with the darkened screen. Hitting 'escape' or 'backspace' produces the same effect. Is there any way to disable this unceasing search function?

This is something you need to report via the Feedback button (or use the link on the Help menu).
Firefox 5.0 is still in BETA and not slated for release until June 21.
Reinstall the full version of the current release which is v4.0.1, download link at the top of this forum.

RoboHelp's Search Function

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