This week, I’m going to post a series of tips about RoboHelp, mostly concerning FlashHelp. I realize that FlashHelp isn’t a commonly used output, at least not as common as Microsoft HTML Help or WebHelp, but in my opinion, that’s all the more reason to post about it. Often, those who do use it can’t find much on the Web to help solve their problems.

The Problem

When you generate a FlashHelp output from RoboHelp, you want to take a look on your computer before publishing the files to a server. But a warning comes up that says, “Flash Player has stopped a potentially unsafe operation.” It won’t let you view your output.

The Solution

Go to the Flash Player Settings Manager page on Adobe’s Web site. This link should take you directly to the security settings tab (see the image).

Flash Player Settings Manager Panel

Then do the following:

  1. Click the Always allow radio button.
  2. Click the arrow in the dropdown box that says “Edit locations.”
  3. Click Add location.
  4. If you want an entire drive (which is what I did so I wouldn’t have to browse for a bunch of directories), just enter the letter of the drive, followed by a colon and backslash: “C:\”. If you want a specific directory, click Browse for folder, select the directory, and click Open.
  5. Follow steps 2–4 for each directory where you want to allow Flash content to play unhindered.
  6. To remove a directory, click on it, click the dropdown box, and click Delete location.

But wait—won’t you have to now document these steps for everyone who is going to be viewing your FlashHelp system so they don’t get this error? No, this is a problem when viewing the output locally, not when viewing it over the Internet. If you are sharing the help project with other writers, they’ll want to follow these steps as well.

Related entries (auto-generated):

Tech Tip: Checking WebHelp/FlashHelp Output Files in to Subversion

FlashHelp Tech Tip: Removing IE’s “Click to activate and use this control” Message

Why I’m Thinking about Dropping the FlashHelp Format

Changing a Topic File Name in RoboHelp and Subversion

Deleting a Topic from RoboHelp and Subversion