Nested WebHelp pages

[davenz]

Hello,

I need some guidance please on how to create the correct ditamap structure for a WebHelp deliverable.

My WebHelp deliverable must use a traditional nested page structure. The home page should contain a small number of parent topics. Parent topics should then contain subtopics, and the nesting should continue to include detailed subject matter organised as groups of pages. Navigation breadcrumbs should reflect the nested structure. In other words: exactly how you would expect web-based help pages to operate.

My understand was that to achieve this, my home page should be based on a root DITA bookmap. Adding nested ditamap (not bookmap) files to the bookmap should then create the related WebHelp page hierarchy, including the intermediate pages that lead to detailed pages. My efforts to achieve this just result in topics all appearing on the front page.

What does work however is:

1. Create a root bookmap file
2. Create topic files that only contain a title element; the title is the name of the nested subtopic
3. Continue creating as many topic files as needed to create the nested structure
4. Finally, nest a ditamap file in a topic to create groups of pages that contain the detailed subject matter

This gives me something very close to the WebHelp structure and navigation breadcrumbs behaviour that I want. But I'm not sure if I've stumbled onto a hack, or if there if a better way of doing this. Any advice or recommendations appreciated.

I'm using Oxygen XML Editor Professional 21 and the WebHelp Responsive transformation type.

Cheers,
Dave

[ionela]

Hi,

When you use submap, its topis are included to the main DITA map. There is no separate markup for a submap or a nested structure.
You can find an example of a DITA map that references a subordinate map here:DITA map that references a subordinate map

The approach you have indicated seems to be correct to create the nested structure you need in the output.

Regards,
Ionela