RoboHelp Office X5 review:1 stars (Functions like a Beta release) - Want support for JavaHelp? Forget it. RoboHelp claims to support JavaHelp, but only supports some of it.
For example, I had to write a utility to "massage" the resulting JavaHelp build xml files because RoboHelp does not recognize multiple controls pointing to a single JavaHelp topic. (No, aliases do not work for JavaHelp.)
Also, neither JavaHelp 1.x nor 2.x recognizes all the formatting codes inserted by RoboHelp. For example, plain old HTML bold tags display properly; RoboHelp's bold style does not. What's the use of using a style then?
Did this company even test the product? I don't think so. In fact, when I used one of my two "freebie" support tickets to force the issue about the multiple control/single topic issue, Macromedia admitted, after sending me a lot of irrelevant material about using aliases, that this was a known bug and there were no plans to fix it.
Want frustrating error-prone version control? Just use RoboHelp's built-in crash-a-rama RoboSource, the program that continually provides errors. Oh, I can get it working, sometimes even for days at a stretch; then it'll start its crashing again, where I have to repeatedly reboot my server, a machine we've had to dedicate to RoboSource. RoboHelp doesn't work with CVS, the version control system we use inhouse, though Macromedia claims it works with SourceSafe. I'll never know, though, because I've learned over the years not to trust Macromedia.
Want support for Eclipse? Forget about it. Doesn't exist.
Perhaps for users who only need to single-source a simple documentation set, such as a WinHelp system coupled with a Word document, this product would work just fine. I'll never know, because the documentation community should be heading in the same direction as the application community: cross-platform compatibility.
I could list other problems and workarounds, but what's the point? I recommend looking elsewhere, depending on your documentation needs. I know I will.
The next sound you hear will be the installation CDs hitting my trash can, and the tapping of my keys as I take this opportunity to find another product....5 stars (Don't listen to the naysayers) - For those of us who were three versions behind, RoboHelp X5 makes my job a lot easier. You can purchase just what you need but I recommend getting this version or you may regret getting "just" this or "just" that & may end up having to get the whole enchilada anyway. Makes no sense. Older versions of RoboHelp, for me, caused topics to get overwritten. Also, this version has conditional text built in. Thanks for those of you who wrote reviews & provided tips, but don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. I highly suggest the RoboHelp author forum at http://www.helpcommunity.ehelp.com/forums/wbpx.dll/~robohelp. I also like the Flash Help feature very much. You can easily go to Project Manager and set your preference for the type of Help output you want. Flash Help makes the Help for our product look very slick. My coworkers agree. I highly suggest that you upgrade if you haven't already. Another reason you should purchase this product (and no, I don't work for Macromedia) is that eHelp no longer "owns" the product. Macromedia supports it. Sure, you may not get a break on the price but guess what? Unless you're a registered user, you won't be able to access free skins online anymore. Macromedia has made the product more proprietary than ever. So, with improvements formerly via eHelp Corp. comes disappointments. They want you to upgrade, yes. You will have to pay, yes. Pirated software? If we all did that, you'd probably be paying an even bigger price for the prized software.Good luck, & if you want to create your own Help project by hand, then don't buy the product. RoboHelp X5 literally saves weeks of work and if it has a few bugs, what software product doesn't? I personally would not want to be slaving over Help files all weekend doing them manually. That's MY six hundred or so bucks' worth...but I got my company to pay for my version. So what are you griping about? Cut a purchase order and get reimbursed or use your company's credit card!1 stars (Overpriced and very disappointing.) - ADDITION TO MY REVIEW: After updating an old Help project for a Java application, I learned that this version of RoboHelp automatically and without warning changes all map IDs to a different form than the older version, with NO provision in RoboHelp X5 for generating IDs in the old format. Solution: go in and manually change all the map IDs to the old format. This is INEXCUSABLE and makes upgrading from an old version of RoboHelp A TOTAL WASTE OF TIME AND MONEY.
And get this: If you have two topic files with the same name IN DIFFERENT FOLDERS, the properties box for each file shows the map IDs for BOTH files, with no indication which ID is actually assigned to each file. Really helpful.
ORIGINAL REVIEW: There is very little that is "robo" (i.e., automated) about RoboHelp. Sure, it will auto-generate things when you ask it to, but its output is so erratic and incomplete you might as well do it all by hand.
As a manual Help creation tool, it's got a nice complement of features, but let me tell you about a couple of little quirks or bugs...
You're supposed to be able to switch the type of output you get from RoboHelp at any point in your project. We started out with the goal of producing WebHelp, then switched to MS HTML help. Well, the part where you define what's available in your final output (Window definitions) did not come along for the switch. It took some time to realize that we had to delete the window definitions and define new ones in order for RoboHelp to actually produce the output we wanted.
Another little quirk is that when you add a hyperlink to existing text in a bulleted list, RoboHelp throws in a bunch of space characters (from 3 to 10) between the bullet and the text. And the WYSIWYG editor is not really WYSIWYG, not that that's any surprise, but it won't allow you to do everything you want to do. There is a TrueCode editor to let you get around that, if you know your way around HTML.
A new quirk that I've been wrestling with this morning is that any edit to an existing topic changes the style for that topic, and RoboHelp will not allow me to change it back, even when I edit the HTML directly!
Workarounds, more workarounds, and living with things you can't work around--expect to spend a lot of time developing your project's Help file with RoboHelp.
