Comparing Documentation Server Software - MadCap Feedback Server and RoboHelp Server

I am often asked about our MadCap Feedback Server and what if any benefits it has over the older RoboHelp Server. Since I have been involved in development of the core architecture and capabilities of both I think I have a unique viewpoint on the subject (however, in full disclosure, remember that while I was part of the team that developed the RoboHelp Server architecture at Blue Sky Software I am now a competitor).

Overview

One of the key original functionalities included in the RoboHelp Server was a natural language search engine, but for some reason¹ Adobe removed that technology making the RoboHelp Server a “one trick pony”. While it has some minor additional features its main reason for existence now is to provide a limited set of “canned” feedback reports tracking customer usage. On the other hand the MadCap Feedback Server provides the same customer tracking capabilities but allows you to create an unlimited number of custom reports using a built in report and statistics generation engine. In addition the MadCap Feedback Server also contains a full Web 2.0 customer commenting capability allowing your customers to become part of the documentation process.

Another extremely important point is the consistency that MapCap Software builds into all of the different publishing formats supported. The same customer experience is available on the desktop experience (DotNet Help or Microsoft HTML Help), in the web browser (WebHelp), or from the MadCap Feedback Server (WebHelp Plus). For example, our Web 2.0 community commenting capabilities are available in every format listed above, even the desktop formats. With the current RoboHelp technology it seems that every different output generated has a radically different set of capabilities leaving the author to do an extreme amount of research to make sure that the features that they need will indeed be supported by the format they need to publish.

Capabilities

Search - The MadCap Software tools create content search capabilities that are far superior to anything available in the industry at a matching price point and greatly surpass the capabilities in the RoboHelp line.

Results Order: In older tools (including RoboHelp) search results are presented in an alphabetized list. This was easy to do within web browsers, but is not that helpful to the user. Imagine a set of Google search results that were alphabetized, how helpful would that be? No, the state of the art in search technology requires that the search results be relevancy ranked. To support this MadCap tools have implemented several ranking algorithms that provide a full relevancy ranked results list, much like a Google search, to the users. This is also done without any browser plug-ins or any other technology necessary. This helps your customers find the most relevant information as quickly as possible.

Synonyms: Both the MadCap and RoboHelp server technologies provide mechanisms for manually adding synonym support to the search capabilities (based on the tracking and usage reports). However, only the MadCap technology goes a huge step further and incorporates any hand built indexing data into the search parameters. If you have built a good index complete with synonym support, alternate phrasings, and commonly sought concepts, then all of this data is used to augment the search - automatically. This precludes the need to go back and manually enter a bunch of synonym data twice the way that RoboHelp forces you to do.  

Web 2.0 - The MadCap Feedback Server support for Web 2.0 community technologies is a complete turnkey system. Once installed there is nothing that your developers or programmers need to do to make this work. All that is required is for you to select the appropriate options while publishing your Flare projects to turn these capabilities on. In contrast, the few similar options that Adobe has introduced are limited to the Air output only (not available in the more popular WebHelp) and even then require either programmer/developer hours or Rube Goldberg-esque scenarios where data files have to be emailed back and forth between users.

Page Ratings: Any user can rate any page/topic from one to five stars showing how helpful that topic was to them. These user rankings are combined and averaged on the server and then displayed in the toolbar of the topic. At any time all users can see the overall quality ranking of any topic. With the MadCap Feedback Server technology this capability is available in all desktop and browser-based formats, which with Flare Version 4 will include a native option to build Air-based help. With RoboHelp technology, topic ratings are not available for browser-based or desktop formats and are only available with Air-based help. Even then, it requires programmer resources as this technology is not natively supported by the RoboHelp server.

Topic Comments: The MadCap Feedback Server provides the ability for any user to append their own comments at the bottom of any page if you allow them to. There are two levels of control. First who can post is controlled and you can choose to allow anonymous comments or you can require that commenter’s register first with a valid email address. Second, you can control the visibility of comments. You can set the system so that comments go live immediately or they have to be approved by you first. With the MadCap Feedback Server technology this capability is available in all desktop and browser-based formats, which with Flare Version 4 will include a native option to build Air-based help. With RoboHelp technology, comments are not available for browser-based or desktop formats and are only available with Air-based help. Even then, it requires programmer resources as this technology is not natively supported by the RoboHelp server.

Availability

The MadCap Feedback Server is available as either server software you purchase and install on your own hardware or as a hosted solution on our servers that you can contract. This hosting has proven quite popular both with small shops who don’t want to deal with server installs/maintenance and also with larger teams that want a short term contract with our hosting while they are in development and then switch to a purchased version when they go live with their project. This allows them to begin testing extremely early in the process. With the RoboHelp solution your only option is the software purchase. 

Architecture

The MadCap Feedback Server is built natively around the C#/.NET technologies to completely integrate into the server environment. The RoboHelp model was written in the older C++ language and then has a translation layer/wrapper written around it disguising this older core technology behind a .NET veneer. While this worked, it did result in some unintended consequences. Most people using the RoboHelp Server in a production environment with even medium loading find that they need to reboot the server at least weekly to keep the performance up. There are no such reboots necessary with the MadCap Feedback Server.

The RoboHelp Server also requires that the content files be stored on the very same machine as the RoboHelp Server. This means that you are locked in to putting everything on a Microsoft IIS server. In a MadCap Software tool work flow generated content files can be run on the same Microsoft IIS server as the MadCap Feedback Server, or your content files can be hosted on a single Unix or Linux machine or even on a farm of machines for load balancing. This can be critical for high traffic situations. It also comes in handy if your company is a Linux/Unix shop, you won’t have to explain why you need a bunch of new Microsoft servers just to host your documentation.

Summary

While the RoboHelp Server was good for its time (initially launched as the MindReader Server in 2001 by eHelp Corporation, formerly Blue Sky Software) its core architecture is out of date and in need of a complete re-write from the ground up using modern technologies and standards. On the other hand, the MadCap Feedback Server is an example of modern technologies implemented in a standards compliant manner allowing for maximum flexibility and reliability. Add to this the additional Web 2.0 community capabilities on top of the usage tracking/reporting capabilities and it is easy to see that MadCap Software is not only keeping pace with the state of the art in online documentation but is actually leading the industry into the future.

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(1) When Adobe removed the natural language search capabilities from the RoboHelp Server they claimed it was because nobody used it. What is interesting is that several months earlier I had recieved a phone call from a vendor claiming that I, as a representative of RoboHelp, owed them several years of back royalties for the natural language technology in use behind the RoboHelp Server. They had found my name associated with RoboHelp via a Google search. I informed them that since February of 2005 I had no part of the RoboHelp business but that it was now owned by Adobe. The other end of the conversation was something like, “Oh, really!” and then just a few months later Adobe announced the removal of natural language search from the server. Interesting.

STC Summit Update

Last night the trade show exhibit opened and today was the first full day of exhibits. It was great seeing old friends and making new ones but WOW were we busy!

As attendees entered the registration was on their left.

 

Once past the registration windows attendees found the entrance archway to the exhibit hall.

This year we did a full 20 foot by 20 foot booth to hopefully better handle the number of people that wanted to attend our demos and speak with our staff. The booth looked like:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This was definately a much bigger booth than we had last year. How did it work out at containing the crowds?

Well, we tried. ;0)

 

MadCap Software at the STC Summit in Philly

For those folks attending the STC Summit in Philadelphia make sure to swing by the exhibit hall and introduce yourself. We will have a full staff in attendance with representatives from sales, tech support, development, even executive management. Any possible question you might have for us, there will be someone in the booth who will have the answer.

It should be a great show. We are pulling out all of the stops as it were with a big 20 foot x 20 foot booth right at the exhibit hall entrance. We will have our in booth theatre up and running, we will have excellent take-aways (the usual t-shirts but this year we have added mouse-pads and even temporary tattoos for the adventurous), and five different prize draws throughout the show. The prize draws will be at the end of lunch and the end of exhibit hours each day and we will be giving away hundreds and hundreds of dollars worth of software at each prize draw so don’t miss them!

 This show will also be the official unveiling of our “rogue writer” logo gear, with the obligatory propeller. We will have a limited number of t-shirts and mouse-pads with this new logo, and even temporary tattoos of it as well. This was meant to be a bit of a gag but based on early feedback I think this gear is going to be far more popular than we anticipated so if you want something with the “rogue writer” graphic on it you should probably get to the booth early in the show.

Below I have also included the full schedule for the topics being covered in the booth theatre for those who want to start planning their STC game plan early.

MadCap in Booth Presentation Schedule

Monday, June 2 (Exhibit Hall Open 10:30-7:00)

       Time         Location             Topic
10:50 – 11:10    MadCap   Topic-based Authoring – The Key to 
                           Booth      Advanced Single-sourcing
                                          Sharon Burton, Product Manager

11:35 – 11:55    MadCap   MadCap Software – Complete Product 
                           Booth      Line Overview
                                          Mike Hamilton, V.P. Product Management

  1:35 – 1:55     MadCap     Top Five Features of MadCap Flare –
                          Booth        Through the Eyes of a Technical Writer
                                           Paul Stoecklein, Senior Technical Writer

  3:05 – 3:25     MadCap     MadCap Lingo Demo – 
                          Booth        Translation and Localization 
                                           Mike Hamilton, V.P. Product Management

  3:50 – 4:10     MadCap     MadCap Mimic Demo – Quick Tour
                          Booth        Patricia Dear, Product Manager

4:35 – 4:55      MadCap      MadCap Analyzer – 
                         Booth         Content Analysis in Real Time
                                           Neil Perlin, Industry Expert/Certified Trainer

 6:35 – 6:55     MadCap     MadCap Flare Demo – XML-based 
                         Booth        Authoring and Publishing  
                                          Mike Hamilton, V.P. Product Management

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Tuesday, June 3 (Exhibit Hall Open 9:00-6:00)

     Time            Location                     Topic
10:05 – 10:25    MadCap    MadCap Analyzer Demo – 
                           Booth       Automated Content Analysis and Validation
                                           Sharon Burton, Product Manager

10:30 – 11:30    Room       Advanced Print Publishing with 
                          109B        MadCap Flare
                                          Mike Hamilton, V.P. Product Management

11:35 – 11:55   MadCap     Sharing Variables Between Flare and Mimic:
                          Booth       Single-source Publishing Across Media Types
                                          Neil Perlin, Industry Expert/Certified Trainer

 2:35 – 2:55     MadCap      MadCap Software – Complete Product 
                         Booth         Line Overview
                                           Mike Hamilton, V.P. Product Management

  4:05 – 4:25    MadCap     MadCap Flare Demo – XML-based 
                         Booth        Authoring and Publishing
                                          Mike Hamilton, V.P. Product Management

 5:35 – 5:55    MadCap     Cross References – 
                        Booth        Putting Your Links on Steroids
                                         Paul Stoecklein, Senior Technical Writer
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Wednesday, June 4 (Exhibit Hall Open 9:00-1:15)

       Time        Location               Topic
10:05 – 10:25   MadCap    MadCap Blaze Demo – 
                         Booth        Advanced, Topic-based, Print Publishing
                                          Sharon Burton, Product Manager

11:35 – 11:55   MadCap    MadCap Software – Complete Product 
                          Booth       Line Overview
                                          Mike Hamilton, V.P. Product Management

 

 

 

Flare WebHelp Running On Windows Mobile 6

Every now and then I stumble onto something that really excites me. Today was one of those days.

Folks who know me know that I am a mobile device nut. Well, today I received an invitation to participate in a beta program for a new Windows Mobile 6 compatible browser called SkyFire http://www.skyfire.com/ .

 

It is a neat new concept for mobile browsers as it renders the entire page just as you would see it on a desktop and then allows you to zoom in to read the text. I was hopping around the Internet checking various sites and then I gave the MadCap Software home page a try and it rendered beautifully. Even the short movie at the top of the page animated properly. This really is a great new mini-browser. Then I got an idea. What about the tech support Knowledge Base that was published in WebHelp format? I pointed skyfire at the url and it loaded beautifully!

 Then I tapped over the WebHelp TOC (Table of Contents) and a little zoom marker appeared.

Clicking again on the zoom marker zoomed directly in on the WebHelp TOC allowing me to open/close books and select a topic.

I was then able to drag the screen to scroll around and read the topic.

 Now, I realize that this may not be the most exciting thing, but remember, this knowledge base was designed and built for a large desktop browser. Imagine creating a custom MadCap Flare Skin file optimized for this smaller screen size. For the first time fully interactive document access of a system of potentially thousands of pages of content with integrated search, table of contents, index, etc. all in the palm of your hand!

The folks working on skyfire are doing some pretty cool work and I will be spending some time figuring out how to best leverage this new browser for documentation purposes. My apologies if some of the screen shots above ended up a little “crunchy”, I assure you they looked pretty darn good before the jpeg compression. Just in case, I recorded a short little video of the process in case it helps to show things in a more meaningful manner than my excited ramblings.

 

 

 

 

 

WritersUA Trade Show Follow Up

I have finally had the time to process a few pictures from the WritersUA trade show that was in Portland, Oregon this year so now I can write about it. The show turned out to be a huge success for us!

It was pretty much a non-stop whirlwind of a show as we kicked things off Sunday night and I don’t think any of us slept much until the exhibit portion of the show ended late on Tuesday. The exhibit opened early Monday morning. After the success of our in booth theatre last year we decided to do it again this year and the crowds were even larger!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then after a full day of presentations, exhibiting, product demos, and talking to hundreds of people we showed our lighter side. We rented one of the upstairs meeting rooms for the evening and hosted, of all things, a MadCap Software Ping Pong Palooza party. It was really informal, chips, pretzels, open bar, and lots of schmoozing and chatting. Oh, and lots of ping pong as well.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tuesday was another long exhibit day but the day was capped off with a MadCap Software reception with food and drinks for the entire show. It was a great way to finish off a long three days.

All in all another great trade show. A chance for us to meet with customers face to face, listen to their requests, and occasionally help out with a tip here or a best practice there. If you get the chance to attend one of the industry events I hope you will come by the booth and introduce yourself, you never know, you might get invited to a ping pong party.

 

The Tradeshow Season Continues

Whew! Things are busy right now. As I mentioned in my last post trade show season is a really busy time. In fact, I am updating this blog from Atlanta as I am here for the Currents event.

The Techshoret show in Israel went amazingly well. The people were great, the weather was great, the venue was great, all in all an excellent experience. I want to say thank you to all of the wonderful people who took the time to attend my sessions and speak with me throughout the event.

But now, the show that has been keeping me busy (and somewhat delinquent in posting more regularly) since my return is the WritersUA show. If you are going to be at the show make sure to swing by the MadCap Software booth and get the scoop on all of the events we have planned. We are starting early and going non-stop through the entire show. In addition to the exhibit booth and the theatre we set up we will also be hosting an extremely informal “Ping Pong Palooza” on Monday night after all of the official show festivities have ended. For those that don’t know Ping Pong is a major past time among the MadCap staff (especially the developers). In keeping with that interest, and our somewhat irreverent ways, we have commandeered a “meeting room” in the hotel Monday night and we have already arranged to get a ping pong table delivered and set up. You can watch the MadCap staff battle each other (while you drink our beer and soda) or if you are a brave soul you can challenge one of the MadCap staff to a game. We will even have prizes for anyone who can beat one of the MadCap staff. There is even a rumor that if anyone can beet our CTO, Bjorn Backlund, they will even get to choose their very own feature for the next release of one of our products…but check the fine print with Bjorn. ;0)

We will also be hosting a drinks and snacks reception for the entire show on Tuesday night so folks can again drink our beer and talk to the MadCap staff. This has become a somewhat unofficial kick off point for the completely unofficial Australasian Cultural Evening event…something about Tony Self being able to smell free drink coupons from a mile away or some such. ;0)

In any event, if you will be at the show make sure to stay current on all of the activities, and if you aren’t going to be there, well, we are currently making plans for the STC show as well so there will be another opportunity!

On the Road Again…

Well, it is that time of year again. When I spend more time in hotel rooms and airplane cabins than in my own house. In the Tech Comm industry late February through June have a crazy number of trade shows and events.

On Monday (tomorrow) I am off to Jerusalem, Israel. I am going over to exhibit and do presentations for the Techshoret Communications Conference . After the show I will be spending a few additional days in Israel spending time with our partners and customers doing demos and holding meetings.

After the Techshoret event I spend a week back in San Diego and then I am off to the the Currents event hosted by the STC Atlanta chapter. This has always been a fun event for me and reminds me very much of the STC Regional events that used to be scheduled, though it definitely isn’t billed that way.

After Currents I fly direct to Portland, OR for the WritersUA Show. This is one of the larger events of the year for us and we have a lot planned. Exhibits, dinners, cocktail receptions, demos, presentations, the works.

If you will be attending any of these events be sure to swing by and say hi. If you won’t be at the event, but will be in the area feel free to drop me a note. I can usually find time in my schedule to hold a quick meeting over coffee somewhere and many times the best ideas for making MadCap Software products better come from quick meetings like this. I have even been known to break out a small portable projector late in the evening at a pub and do a quick demo on the wall for a handful of interested folks.

Well, I’m off to pack,

Cheers!

MadCamp

While we have been offering formal training classes since the release of Flare version 1.0 we have recently introduced the VIP version of our certified Flare training and this VIP version is called MadCamp.

Traditionally our classes are held at a customers location if they have enough students and the facility, or they are held in rented facilities, or sometimes we offer the training on-line. We haven’t offered classes at our headquarters in the past, but we have wanted to. For various reasons this never came to pass, but with our moving into our new office space in La Jolla, CA (ironically the very same building where I first worked for Blue-Sky Software back in the mid ’90s) all of the pieces are now in place.

Once the decision was made to offer training classes at our new headquarters we decided to “kick things up a notch”. Instead of the normal three day Basic/Intermediate Flare course we would offer something a little different. This new course would be four days, would include the basic/intermediate course and would also include the one day Advanced Flare CSS course as well. Then to really make it different we included some additional perks such as lunch with the programmers, QA team, and tech support staff on one day and a candid preview/discussion of future products and the MadCap Software road map. All of this combined constitutes the MadCamp Training Course.

We held the first MadCamp last week (February 12-15) and it was a great success! I had a lot of fun teaching the class and the students seemed to really enjoy the experience. The La Jolla weather was even nice enough that on the first day we all grabbed the catered bag lunches and took a lunch field trip to the La Jolla cove where we ate on the grass with views of the ocean and the seals.

I want to thank the students and congratulate them on being the graduating class of the first MadCamp ever!

My must have travel apps for Windows Mobile 6.

I do an almost scary amount of travel for business every year. Last year (2007) I spent more than 137 nights in hotels and logged well over 100,000 airline miles. One of the things that makes this amount of travel much easier is carrying a Windows Mobile device with a few must have applications.

First, the device. I have carried several over the years, starting with a Palm, then moving to an HP iPaq 5555/Windows Mobile 2003, then an HP iPaq hx2495/Windows Mobile 5, and now I’m carrying the AT&T Tilt/Windows Mobile 6 device. I have found all of these devices extremely useful, but the AT&T Tilt is my first truly integrated device with PDA, phone, data, Internet, and GPS all supported.

I absolutely love this device and I find more and more uses for it on every trip. The capabilities that I use extensively:

• Phone - Quality as good as any phone I have ever used
• Quad-band GSM - I travel internationally and need a phone that will work everywhere
• Voice dialing - much safer than hunting and pecking while driving
• 3G data - I’m hooked on being always connected
• Bluetooth - It is really convenient to go hands free a lot of the time (cars, airports, etc.)
• GPS - I have become a Google maps for mobile junkie!
• Slide out keyboard - Often it is more economical for me to text while overseas

The capabilities that I wanted, but find that I rarely if ever use:

• WiFi - With an unlimited data plan it is just easier to use 3G
• Camera - The camera is OK, but after a digital SLR this just doesn’t pass the quality test
• Microsoft Exchange integration - Too many IT road blocks

In any case, enough with the hardware, the point of this post is to highlight some applications that make travel much, much easier.

First on my list is an application that I have been using ever since my days with a green/gray screen Palm device. This application is called Metro.

Metro

This is an absolute must have piece of mobile software for anyone who travels and uses public transportation. With support for almost every major city in the world Metro allows you to plan subway, trolley, light rail, and even some bus journeys with ease.

First load the correct city. Then enter your current location and the location you are trying to reach. Then Metro will plot your journey telling you what line to take, where to make transfers and which lines to transfer to and how long the journey should take. Metro will even calculate the journey two ways, shortest time or fewest connections/transfers.

I have used Metro extensively on the London Underground system and it makes quick work of finding the optimal routes and directing me to my destinations. I have also used it in the major cities of Germany, in Brussels, in various cities in the U.K. and in many major cities in the United States.

The best part, Metro is a free download thanks to the generosity of its authors, Patrice Bernard & Frank Van Caenegem (with donations happily accepted, of course). You can find more information at the Metro site, or download the software at: http://nanika.net/metro/ .

Google Maps Mobile

Having used Google Maps extensively on the desktop I had high hopes for the mobile version and Google Maps didn’t let me down. In fact, I have become a bit of a Google Maps Mobile junkie. I use this application daily. With its ability to plot near real time traffic data it is a life saver for folks like myself that have long commutes. The only issues I have found with using Google Maps Mobile are that 1) If your device doesn’t have GPS capabilities then the power of this application is significantly diminished, and 2) Google Maps Mobile is an absolute bandwidth hog! If you don’t have an unlimited data plan then be careful. This is also the reason that I don’t use this application when I am outside of the USA, combine the high cost of roaming data charges with massive data use and Google Maps Mobile could become expensive very quickly.

GPS Tuner

Being an admitted GPS junkie I was going into Google Maps Mobile withdrawals when I travelled internationally. I just couldn’t bear to deal with the massive roaming charges it would rack up. Then I found GPS Tuner and it is now a major must have application for me when I am travelling abroad. Where most GPS/mapping software uses pre-defined map data GPS Tuner uses any map saved as jpg image. This means that you have total control over the area covered and you don’t even need a live data connection. Before you leave on your trip you can use your favorite mapping software and then take a handful of screen captures and pre-load them onto your mobile device for GPS Tuner to use. Of course, the GPS savvy out there should be questioning just how this could possibly work. It is actually quite simple. You launch GPS Tuner, load the graphic image for the area you are in, and then teach GPS Tuner two reference GPS coordinates. Just turn on your GPS capability and click on the map the exact location where you are currently standing. Then walk 200 feet in any direction and teach GPS Tuner this new location by clicking on the map. After these two simple data points this software just works! I think the time that this software amazed me was in Brussels. I hadn’t planned on staying in Brussels, but due to changes in my business schedule I found myself in Brussels over a Saturday. I didn’t have the opportunity to preload any map images, but while walking downtown I came across a map posted on a bus station. I used the camera on my mobile to snap a shot of the map on the bus station enclosure, then loaded this snap into GPS Tuner and it worked great. GPS Tuner has become my standby whenever I can’t use Google Maps Mobile. GPS Tuner can be found at www.gpstuner.com and a copy retails for about $30 US.

FlightStatus

This doesn’t really qualify as a piece of software as it is actually a web site designed to support mobile browsers, but it can be a life saver. The site address is http://mobile.flightstats.com/go/Mobile/flightStatusByFlight.do. This site allows you to enter your airline and flight number and get real time flight data, often before the data has even been announced by the airline. Recently I was in Chicago on a layover and it seemed like the airline staff was awfully slow in updating the status board. It just didn’t feel right so I fired up my mobile device and went to this site and found that my flight had been canceled. I immediately left the gate area and went straight to the airline customer care center to book an alternate flight. Just as I was arriving at the customer care center the airline made the announcement over the PA system that the flight had been canceled. A few minutes later there was a line of over a hundred people behind me. The FlightStatus site gave me enough of a jump that I beat the crowd and was able to get an alternate flight while I’m sure a lot of  other folks ended up stuck in Chicago over night.

Well, that is my short list of must have mobile apps for those who travel.

Cheers!

The Ultimate Style Sheet Tip in MadCap Flare

I speak with literally hundreds of Flare users every month and one frustration that I hear over and over is about the strict nature of using CSS styles in an XML environment.

People are used to creating styles in an application like Microsoft Word and then being able to use those styles anywhere. Due to the strict nature of XML if you create a paragraph CSS style then it can only be used in paragraphs. If you create a list style then it can only be used in lists, and so on. This strict enforcement can be frustrating. You have a perfectly good style called p.MyStyle that makes text neon blue, italic, underlined, and with a lime green background (because that is soooo user friendly) and you want to apply this style to the second step in your procedure…but you can’t. Since this is a paragraph style you can’t use it in the list you are using to number your procedure steps.

At this point some folks would go on to create another style called li.MyStyle and go through all of the work to match the attributes of this new style to perfectly match the paragraph version. But, this is completely unecessary! What if I where to tell you that there was a way to create a single style in your Flare CSS Style Sheet that could be used on any element, anywhere in your topics, at any time?! Well, that is exactly what we are going to do.

Creating a Paragraph Class

1. First, open Flare and open your active CSS file in the Flare style editor.
2. Now, select the p element in the style sheet editor. We need to select it because we are going to make a new class attached to it.
3. Once you have the p element selected, go to the toolbar and click on the “Add Class” option.
4. Name the new class “Tip” and click OK. You will now have a new style class called p.Tip.
5. Add some attributes to your new style class such as a background color, border lines, etc. Add the attributes so that you can definately see a change when the style class is applied to text in your topics.

OK, now we have a standard paragraph style that can be applied to any paragraph in your project. But, try to apply this new tip style to text in a table, or in a list, or in any element that isn’t a proper paragraph and poof, your nice new style disapears from the list of available styles. Now for the magic part!

Converting a Paragraph Class to a Generic Class

1. OK, locate your CSS file in the Content Explorer view.
2. Right click on your CSS file and select “Open with > Internal Text Editor”
3. Now that you have access to the actual CSS code, scroll down to the bottom and find your style p.tip.
4. Now for the magic part. Place your cursor in front of the p in the p.tip entry and….press the delete key. You want to delete the letter p and leave the .tip part.
5. Save the edited CSS file by clicking on the save icon on the toolbar or pressing Ctrl-S.

You now have what is called a Generic Style. Open a topic in your project and place the cursor anywhere you want, in a table, in a list, in a paragraph, and no matter where you place your cursor you should now have access to your tip style.

This is a technique that can be used to make any style settings you create available at any time anywhere in your Flare project. The most important part is that this is all perfectly legal with regards to XML and CSS and won’t cause any problems with your project.

Enjoy!