Document conversion problems in HDK

To find the error, (use a copy of the document) make it into two documents and see which half crashes.
Remember to put a Heading 1 at the start of the second half.

Reboot and then split that document in half until you find the problem. Also watch the compile process for clues on which topic has the problem.

Once you find the topic with the problem, go to the original document and copy the text to Notepad then back. This will clean up the code. If what you find is a table, select the table and convert it to text then back again to clean up the table.

Sometimes the problem is with an imbedded graphic, normalise the graphic in some way and then reinsert it.

HDK features that are also in XDK:

• a number of table of contents options (more in v3.6)
  
• Styles, HDK generates a CSS based on the MSWord paragraph and character styles
  
• projects can process a "header" file or you can mock one up to control the names of the output HTML pages
  
• HTML pages can be split out of a single Word document using paragraph styles
  
• projects can include multiple Word documents.
  

Word Automatic numbering fix:

(from: Steve Hudson , HDK List MVP)
Just prior to publishing, make a copy of your document and open that copy.
Press Alt+F11 (opens the VBE), Ctrl+G (goto Immediate Window) and type

ActiveDocument.ConvertNumbersToText

This 'hard-codes' all lists in the document, numbers and bullet points.

The Desperate HDK fix

1. Backup the whole project
2. Export the template and save it.
3. Go back to the old project and in each of the documents Select All then add the content as item in the Gallery.
4. Make a new project using the exported template
5. Make a new document inserting a Gallery item into each new document.
6. Check that you have the same number of documents as the original project.
7. Go into Topic Outliner and in full screen mode clean up the structure of your hierarchy.
8. Clean up any duplicates (like graphics).
9 Compile and check for errors

Hypertext and PDF?

Use hypertext (WinHelp & HTML) as the trunk and branches and PDF as the leaves. Hypertext for the information that can be read on the screen and PDF for detail that needs to be printed to be read.

Opening another instance of the browser

In the HDK URL box add the URL and the target
After the URL add a closing quote
then the exact next line
target="_blank

Note no closing quote for the target string, HDK will supply that.