Technical Writing ToolBox

A picture says a thousand words. What about a video? How many words can you save by adding a video to your documentation?
This tutorial explains how to add a Captivate video in RoboHelp.

Approach #1: Use Captivate and RoboHelp as two separate software

Open Captivate. Create a video in Captivate and generate the output as Flash (SWF). Make sure that you have checked the option of “Export to HTML” since not selecting this option may generate an output that will not display properly in a web browser. You can generate the flash output using File > Publish or by using the keyboard short-cut Shift + F12.

Open RoboHelp and import the html page you just generated (as if you are importing a normal html page) in RoboHelp. You can do this by File > Import > HTML File. 

Alternatively, you can also add a Captivate video using RoboHelp toolbar. Click Captivate icon in the Objects toolbar. This displays a dialog box where you can directly select the swf file.

Note: If you cannot see this toolbar then it may be hidden.You can display it by View > Toolbars > Object.

Approach #2: Work within RoboHelp environment

Sometimes you want to generate quick demonstration videos within RoboHelp environment without opening Captivate. RoboHelp provides an option to add a captivate video without the need of leaving RoboHelp environment.

Select View > Pods > Project Manager. The Project Manager pod appears. Right click on Project Files, select New > Adobe Capotivate Demo.

A dialog box appears. You can add name of the video and the corresponding html page.

Click OK.  Create the Demo and close the Captivate window. Since you started the process within RoboHelp environment, there is no need to import the video.

You can add this page in TOC, or create a link to this page from other pages in the project.

When a user view the page the video automatically starts.

Note: Sometimes, the automatic play becomes a bit annoying. If you want the video to start after a user clicks on it, select Edit > Preferences in Captivate, select Start and End preferences, deselect the option to Auto Play. This will publish a play button inside the video and a user will need to click on the video to start it.

What do you think about this tutorial? Do you use a different approach to add captivate videos in RoboHelp? Leave a comment and let me know.