RE: expanding without expanding

Subject: RE: expanding without expanding
From: "McLauchlan, Kevin" <Kevin -dot- McLauchlan -at- safenet-inc -dot- com>
To: Peter Grainge <pgforums -at- gmx -dot- com>, "techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>
Date: Wed, 15 May 2013 10:09:48 -0400

Hmm. If RoboHelp does, then Flare probably does. Might be worthwhile pursuing.

Any suggestions on how to name the two versions?

-----Original Message-----
From: Peter Grainge
Sent: May-14-13 3:07 PM
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Subject: Re: expanding without expanding

RoboHelp allows you to produce printed documentation with or without the dropdown content included. Produce two PDFs?
________________________________________

Peter Grainge
www.grainge.org


On Tue, 14 May 2013 18:02:16 +0100, McLauchlan, Kevin <Kevin -dot- McLauchlan -at- safenet-inc -dot- com> wrote:

> All,
> I've been doing WebHelp only, for years.
>
> Some procedures have multiple steps and occupy a page or so, if all
> steps remain "closed".
>
> The same procedure expands hugely if the expanding/drop-down text
> (including graphic items) in each step are expanded. That works fine
> in WebHelp.
>
> In WebHelp, a person who is new to our product can expand any step
> where they are unsure, while an experienced person doesn't need to see
> all that newbie stuff if they just want a refresher on the order of steps.
>
> Now that we have a mandate to also produce PDF output, such a
> procedure would be fully expanded, and therefore hugely long for both
> the newbie and the person with experience.
>
> As a brute-force approach, I could re-write the procedure without the
> expansion stuff, and have that as the main instruction for all users,
> and then have a cross-ref to an appendix containing the fully-expanded
> version, for benefit of newbies.
>
>
> Is there a better way?
>
> No, we can't use footnotes for the expansions when publishing as PDF.


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Follow-Ups:

References:
expanding without expanding: From: McLauchlan, Kevin
Re: expanding without expanding: From: Peter Grainge

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