Adobe RoboHelp 2015: Dynamic Filters

by Willam van Weelden Follow us on Twitter View our profile on LinkedIn
 
A few weeks ago I showed you how to use named Conditional Build Expressions to include or exclude content from your output. RoboHelp 2015 has a new feature to make tags even more useful: Dynamic Filters.

With traditional Conditional Build Expressions you choose to exclude specific content from your output. Once you generate the output, content is included or excluded from the output. If you use build tags to target multiple audiences, you have to create an output for every audience. Enter Dynamic Filters: With dynamic filters readers dynamically switch the information they want to see.

 
Topic with multiple destinations
 
In the image above there are four holiday destinations in different countries. No country is selected in the Filter by area at the left so the reader sees all of the available content. If the reader selects US, only the content for the US (Mesa Verde, CO) is shown.

With Dynamic Filters you can create a single output where users themselves decide which content they need. You can use this to group content by user role, by module, or by locale.

Add Dynamic Filter to Output

  1. Tag the content in RoboHelp.
  2. Go to the Output tab and select your Responsive HTML5 Single Source Layout.
  3. Select Use Dynamic Content Filter in the output.
    Use Dynamic Content Filter in the output  
  4. Click Customize to open the Dynamic Content Filter dialog box.
  5. From the Define area, click Add criteria button to open theTags and Expressions dialog box. (The Add criteria button is the second icon from the left.)
    Dynamic Content Filter   
  6. Select the tags and expressions you want to include as a filter.
    Tags and Expressions  
  7. Click the OK button.
    Filters added  
  8. Click Save to close the Dynamic Content Filter dialog box.
  9. Click Save and Generate to generate your output.

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Looking to learn RoboHelp? Come join me for my live, two-day online RoboHelp class (held once each month). And if you'd like to learn more about Dynamic Filters, check out my new 3-hour mini course: Adobe RoboHelp: Advanced Content Reuse.

9 Replies to “Adobe RoboHelp 2015: Dynamic Filters”

  1. This is a great feature, and I’d like to use it in an existing project I created with an earlier version of RoboHelp. I found that the “Responsive HTML5” output is unavailable when you open an old project with RH 2015. I even tried creating a brand new project with RH 2015 and importing files from my old project, but the Responsible HTML5 output is still not available. Is there a way to take advantage of this feature with existing projects? I can’t find anything about converting old RoboHelp projects when searching online. Thank you for any help.

  2. This is a great feature, and I’d like to use it in an existing project I created with an earlier version of RoboHelp. I found that the “Responsive HTML5” output is unavailable when you open an old project with RH 2015. I even tried creating a brand new project with RH 2015 and importing files from my old project, but the Responsible HTML5 output is still not available. Is there a way to take advantage of this feature with existing projects? I can’t find anything about converting old RoboHelp projects when searching online. Thank you for any help.

  3. This is a great feature, and I’d like to use it in an existing project I created with an earlier version of RoboHelp. I found that the “Responsive HTML5” output is unavailable when you open an old project with RH 2015. I even tried creating a brand new project with RH 2015 and importing files from my old project, but the Responsible HTML5 output is still not available. Is there a way to take advantage of this feature with existing projects? I can’t find anything about converting old RoboHelp projects when searching online. Thank you for any help.

  4. Hi Corda,
    The Responsive HTML5 output is available when projects are upgraded but not listed in the pod by default. Try this: right-click the Outputs pod (it used to be called the Single Source Layouts pod) and choose New Output. Responsive HTML5 should be listed in the Output drop-down menu.

  5. Hi Corda,
    The Responsive HTML5 output is available when projects are upgraded but not listed in the pod by default. Try this: right-click the Outputs pod (it used to be called the Single Source Layouts pod) and choose New Output. Responsive HTML5 should be listed in the Output drop-down menu.

  6. Hi Corda,
    The Responsive HTML5 output is available when projects are upgraded but not listed in the pod by default. Try this: right-click the Outputs pod (it used to be called the Single Source Layouts pod) and choose New Output. Responsive HTML5 should be listed in the Output drop-down menu.

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