September 2020 release of Adobe RoboHelp (Update 1 of Summer Release 2020)

This blog post was co-authored with Amitoj Singh, Product Manager for Adobe Technical Communication tools at Adobe.

Hello!

A new month. And a new release of Adobe RoboHelp!

On July 15, we had released the new Adobe RoboHelp Summer 2020 release. We introduced an all-new RoboHelp on Mac, added many new features such as micro-content, out-of-the-box chatbot integration, a new PDF engine, brand new HTML and PDF templates, integration with Customer Support knowledge bases, and a lot more.

And we have been busy since the July release: We just released the brand new RoboHelp Server v11.0 (read more here), and today we have some more exciting news. Drumrolls, please – here comes Update 1 for RoboHelp Summer Release 2020 (a.k.a. 2020.1).

We are appreciative of everyone in RoboHelp Community who continue to provide us with feedback so we can continue to improve the product. We are listening and you would see lot more activity on the RoboHelp side going ahead into the year.

Lets explore what’s new!

Do more with chatbots

We have added new customization options for chatbots. Now you can configure the messages that appear when someone opens the virtual assistant. Or what the virtual assistant can answer when it is unable to find an answer.

These options have been added to the new “Client” tab within the Chatbot output preset.

Single-tab mode

During authoring, many times, we just want to view a topic quickly. However, opening each topic means a new tab is being opened in the authoring window. Imagine searching for a topic but having to open 20 or 30 topics. Would it not be more comfortable if the new topic opens in the same tab instead of a new tab every time? While keeping the flexibility to have edited or not-saved topics open in their original tabs? With Update 1, we have made this super simple: Choose Edit → Preferences, and select Use single tab to open files.

Remove Text Attributes option

Imagine you have a couple of inline formattings (like bold or italic) and some inline elements (like a hyperlink) in a paragraph. And now you want to remove them – selectively, but in one go.

We have brought that option with Update 1 for the Summer 2020 release of Adobe RoboHelp. Just mark up the text or even multiple paragraphs, right-click on it, and select Remove Text Attributes from the context menu. Select the formattings and inline elements you want to remove (or just all of them!) and click Remove. Done.

Many more fixes and features

There are many other features, improvements, and bug fixes that are part of Update 1.

[New] GIT option to restore to a previous version of the file
[New] Easy option to select a paragraph (or part of it) and add that as a new snippet using right-click context menu
[New] support for Micro-content FAQ page in all output presets
[New] Support for Amazon Kindle (KF8)! When you select “eBook” as an output format, you can now publish to both Kindle and EPUB!
[New] Sibling and child elements are now shown in the breadcrumb navigation. The current element path and the siblings are separated by a “|”.
[Improvement] We fixed the UI flickering in the Frameless output when navigating from one topic to another (by clicking on the breadcrumbs).
[Improvement] [Improvement] Add to Variable – Select text in a topic, right-click on it and choose “Add to Variable” from the context menu. The “Define Variable” dialog opens, and you can create a new variable. Yes, it’s exactly that easy.
[Improvement] Multiple enhancements to XLIFF and the translation engine, such as the addition of schema and context to XLIFF exported content.
[Improvement] We did a few enhancements when upgrading from an old RoboHelp Classic project. In previous versions, RoboHelp moved all images and other multimedia assets from the root folder to the new “assets” folder. However, when images were referenced to some external location (outside the project folder), they were not moved but retained in the original location.
[Improvement] Index filtering when using Dynamic content filters has been improved.
[Improvement] We added a couple of advanced options for importing Microsoft Word documents. Now you can create a hierarchy based on the styles for the new topics when having “Add generated topics to Table of Contents” selected.
[Improvement] You can now enable or disable “automatic hyphenation” when generating a PDF. (By default, this option has been kept in a disabled state.)
[Bug Fix] Previously, an empty paragraph was coming before every topic in the Microsoft Word document. Fixed.
[Bug Fix] Variable name changes are now reflected across open and closed topics.
[Bug Fix] We did several smaller fixes to help you keep your RoboHelp up to date more easily. The Help → Update workflow is much smoother now.
[Bug Fix] The “Save All” button got disabled after you opened the “Review” tab. Fixed.
[Bug Fix] Many fixes around localized strings being used within RoboHelp
[Bug Fix] In some cases where RoboHelp was hanging after a machine restart. Fixed.

For a detailed list of all fixes and improvements, please visit Adobe RoboHelp Fixed Issues

To download the latest update of RoboHelp 2020.1, please visit RoboHelp Service Releases Download page

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