Customer Reviews

Sams Teach Yourself RoboHELP 2000 for HTML Help in 24 Hours (Teach Yourself -- Hours)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Char James-Tanny does a great job of covering lots of introductory issues while also giving the reader a taste of the advanced possibilities--JavaScript, ActiveX, etc.; perfect for someone such as myself who is a "technically-capable newbie".

The 24-hour format allows you to explore the chunks that you're most interested in and then go back and forth through the book as needed. As a technical communicator creating my first on-line HTML Help system (I'm using RH7) this book has made it a little less daunting. The author also does a great job in pointing out the resources that are "out there" and never forgets to remind the reader that the users of the help system are our first concern.

Looking through the TOC for this book, I was impressed at the extent to which it covered the applications of RoboHelp. But, once I started using the book, I found myself spending progressively more time trying to understand what the author was saying.

The structure for a good book is here, it just needs a few more months on the desks of some good editors.

I was greatly disappointed with this book. It is poorly organized, and unclear. It takes an application that should be learned fairly easily and makes it that much harder.

When there are multiple ways of doing the same thing, the author lists them in a numbered list which leads you to believe there are mulitple steps involved. Here's one example:

"Creating a New Window"

"To create a new window, you perform the following steps: 1. Select File, New, Window. 2. Right-click over the Windows folder on the Project tab. 3. Select File, Project Settings. Select the Windows tab and then click New."

These are listed as 3 steps, but in fact are just 3 different ways of doing the same thing.

This is just one illustration of poor organization within this entire book.

If you don't have the time or budget to go to a hands-on training class, this book is the best way to learn to use RoboHELP to create HTML Help. In 24 digestible chunks, the book leads you through all the major features of the product. There are plenty of tips to help you get started on the right foot, as well more advanced technical topics to help you "push the envelope" if you're inclined that way.

The author obviously knows her stuff, and I would recommend this book to anyone wanting a comprehensive introduction to RoboHELP HTML.

If you are considering this book, Amazon includes the Table of Contents in the links to the left, where you can see the organizational structure of the 24 hours.

The error in logic mentioned in the second review was actually a typo in the layout codes...the code for a numbered list was used instead of the code for a bulleted list.

This mistake was first discovered in mid-February and has been listed on the book's errata page since late February. The errata page itself was made available in late October, 1999, after the book was first released.

For those who purchased the book before March, the mistake can be found on page 59 in Hour 5. This mistake (and several others) were fixed for the second printing, which started shipping in March.

I would have preferred to not rate this book, but it's a required field. I'm entering a 3 so that the current average remains the same. (Personally, I think it ranks higher than that! ;-) )