Editing a Template

There may be times that you need to edit Doc-To-Help's templates to suit your own needs. You can do this by editing styles in the templates or by creating custom templates.

If necessary, you can create new styles in both your source and target templates (DOTX file). However, if you need to make modifications to the formatting of styles (e.g., change the font color for a style from black to red), you should do so in your target template instead of the source template or document. Keep in mind that style changes in the source template affect only the look of the source documents, which are for your eyes only. Editing the target template changes the look of your final output. For a list of available templates, see Templates and Styles.

Example  

Let's say you change the Heading 1 style in the template to be blue. But in the source document you create based on that template, you change the color for the style to red. When you generate the target, Doc-To-Help ignores the formatting that you did in the source document, and you end up with blue headings.

If you've selected a source template that includes a particular style that is not available in a target template that you select, the source style passes through to the target.

Example  

Let's say you are using D2H_NOMARGIN.dotx as your source template. Within that template, you create a custom style called "BigText" that has a 48-point font.

You then create a source document based on that template, and you apply the "BigText" style to some content.

With D2H_PRNOMARGIN.dotx selected as your target template, you build the output. The "BigText" style is not part of that template, but it passes through and you see it anyway in the output.

Tip It is good practice to back up your original templates so that you can restore them if needed.

  1. In Word, open the Project ribbon to open a source template. Or, open the Target ribbon to open the target template.

  2. To open source templates for editing:

    1. Click the Edit button in the template area of the Project ribbon.

  3. To open target templates for editing:

    1. Click the Edit button in the template section of the Target ribbon.
  1. After the Word template is open, select the Home ribbon, and at the bottom of the Styles group click . The Styles window opens.
  2. Click the style you would like to edit from the list and click the drop-down next to it. Choose Modify. The Modify Style dialog opens.
  3. Select the Format drop-down, then select the attribute you want to modify and make the desired changes.
  4. When you are done, choose New documents based on this template.
  5. Click OK.
  6. Save the template file.

This will only affect the look of a style. If you wish to change its behavior in the final output (e.g., its level or whether the style is automatically added to the TOC or index), see Project Styles.

To add a Source Template, select the Project ribbon and click the Add button in the template section. To add a Target Template, select the Target ribbon and click the Add button in the template section.

To remove a Source Template, select the Project ribbon and click the Removebutton in the template section. To remove a Target Template, select the Target ribbon and click the Removebutton in the template section.

Note Templates are stored at:

\\Users\<user name>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates

If you uninstall Doc-To-Help and reinstall a newer version, the templates will remain in that folder. However, if one of your customized templates uses the same name as one of Doc-To-Help’s default templates, and there is a newer version of that template in the installation, Doc-To-Help will save your version of the template to the following folder:

\\Users\<user name>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates\Backup

The Application Data or App Data folder is a hidden folder. To show hidden folders, open the Folder Options dialog in your operating system (Control Panel > Folder Options). Click the View tab, under Advanced Settings > Files and folders > Hidden files and folders, select the Show hidden files and folders radio button. Click OK.

Note Due to styles set in the default target template, right-to-left (RTL) text containing left-to-right (LTR) text inline will not display properly for NetHelp output in some browsers (e.g., Safari, Microsoft Edge). For example, the LTR text might appear on the far right side of a paragraph when it should be somewhere on the left. To fix this issue for your project, you should modify the Normal style in the target template so that it displays in a RTL format. Use the following steps:

  1. In Word, select Target > Edit.
  2. Select the target template and click Edit.
  3. Open the Home ribbon, and at the bottom of the Styles section click .
  4. In the Styles window, right-click the Normal style and select Modify.
  5. In the lower left corner select Format > Paragraph.
  6. Choose Direction: Right-to-left.
  7. Click OK, then save the target template.
  8. Rebuild the NetHelp target.

If you use Doc-To-Help to create specific kinds of documents, like policies & procedures manuals or knowledge base articles, you might want to create custom templates for these documents rather than using Doc-To-Help's standard templates. Custom templates can be used every time you create a new document so writers do not need to cut-and-paste formatting or copy styles from template to template. You can also provide sample text to remind writers of the information that needs to go in each section.

  1. Open the Microsoft Word Templates folder, located at C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates. Copy the source and target templates that you want to use as a basis for your custom template, and paste them in a new location, such as your desktop or a network drive.

    Important It is recommended that you make copies of an existing Doc-To-Help template to edit rather than creating a template from scratch. This is because Doc-To-Help templates use several proprietary styles and bookmarks to ensure that your output builds correctly.

  2. Open the source template. Make any changes to the default text. You can add sample headings and default text. Any content that appears in the source template will appear in new documents created using the template.

    Note If you create styles in your custom templates, remember to define their authoring behaviors in Doc-To-Help using the Project Styles dialog. See Project Styles.

    Tip If you are creating custom templates and you edit the first-level heading (labeled "Chapter 1" in most templates), be sure that the ChapterHeading bookmark does not get deleted. The ChapterHeading bookmark is necessary for Doc-To-Help to know where to insert content when building output. If it is deleted, you may end up with duplicate content.

    To do this in Word, select the Insert ribbon, then click Bookmark. The Bookmarks dialog opens. If the ChapterHeading bookmark is not listed in the dialog, you can add it. If it is already listed, you do not need to do anything. For more information, see the Microsoft Word online Help.

  3. Save the source template. Be sure to save it as a .DOTX file and use a unique name.

    Note It is important that you save your templates to a shared location, such as a network drive, if you are working with other authors.

    If you are working alone, you can save the template to your C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates folder.

  4. (Optional) Open the target template. If you created any styles in the source template to use while creating your document, use the Word Organizer to copy those styles over to the target template. See Copying Custom Styles to a New Template.

    Note The placeholder text in the target template dictates where your content will be added in the output. Do not change the text in the target template.

  5. Save the target template. Be sure to save it as a .DOTX file and use a unique name.

    Note Be sure to save the template as a unique file even if you did not make any changes to it.

    Note It is important that you save your templates to a shared location, such as a network drive, if you are working with other authors.

    If you are working alone, you can save the template to your C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates folder.

  6. Create a new Doc-To-Help project. When given the option to select a template, select Add my own set of styles from the drop-down, then select your custom template. See Creating Projects.
  7. (Optional) When the Doc-To-Help project opens, be sure to add your target template to the project to use when building output. You will not need to do this if you are using NetHelp as your target, because the HTML template is already selected by default. See Selecting Templates.

Example  

Let's say your company writes knowledge base articles. Your articles need to include five headings: a title, a summary, a description, a solution, and an attribution. You decide to create a custom template that includes headings for each of these sections. Because the articles are often written by different authors, you also want to include some sample text to guide the authors when they create a new article so each article will be written the same way and have a common voice.

To do this, you first create a copy of the source Doc-To-Help template most like the template you want to create. You decide to use D2H_NOMARGIN.dotx as a base for your new template because it is basic and you do not need any extra frills for your knowledge base articles.

For now, you can save the copy of the D2H_NOMARGIN.dotx template to your desktop, since you will be making changes to it. It is important to save a separate copy of the template in a new location, such as your desktop, so it does not get mixed up with the original Doc-To-Help template while you are making changes.

Open the document and make your changes. You add a Title placeholder as a Heading 1, and the rest of your headings as Heading 2s. You also add some sample text in each section. You do not make any style changes.

When you are done, your sample document looks like this:

Save the new source template as Knowledge_Base.dotx. Since you are working with several other authors, be sure to save it to a network drive so everyone has access to it.

Then you copy the coordinating Doc-To-Help target template (D2H_PRNOMARGIN.dotx) to your desktop (again, it is important to keep this copy separate from the original to prevent errors).

Open the copy of the target template. Save it as PR_Knowledge_Base.dotx so you can distinguish it from your source template. You do not make any other changes. Be sure to save your new template to the network drive so other authors can access it.

Once you have saved your copies to the network drive, you can remove the temporary copies from your desktop.

Later, your authors create a new Doc-To-Help project using the Knowledge Base source template.

When they create a new document, they see all of the default text you added to the template. They are able to use this text as a guideline to create the knowledge base article.

The authors also add the new Knowledge Base target template to the project, and use it when building printed output.

Important It is recommended that you update your source templates when you update to ensure that your output is built the way you intended. See Upgrading Old Projects.