The Future of RoboHelp?

by James Sands

By now, you've probably heard about one or several of the recent events regarding RoboHelp. In brief, starting with the oldest news first:

RoboHelp's parent company Blue Sky was renamed eHelp (really old news).
eHelp was then acquired by Macromedia in 2003.
Suggestions and comments later surfaced from an industry expert at the WritersUA Conference in early 2005 regarding the possible "sunset" of RoboHelp by Macromedia (to "sunset" meaning no future development would be done on the tool).
Adobe announced it was planning to acquire Macromedia in April 2005.
Rumors progressed exponentially regarding the impending demise of RoboHelp after the Adobe announcement.

So, what does this mean to you as a RoboHelp user? Is all hope lost? Should you find a new authoring tool this year? What about all of those projects you have already done? To answer these, let's look at a few of the more obvious questions.

First of all, what does it mean to sunset a product?

As a software product ages, a manufacturer often finds that it is no longer profitable to continue developing and upgrading it. One of the manufacturer's choices may be to continue selling the most current version (i.e., RoboHelp X5), while stopping all future development using a "sunset" process. This enables them to gradually phase out the old tool while they establish a newer and better product to replace it. For example, when Microsoft sunset the Windows Help engine several years ago to concentrate on enhancing HTML Help, the Help community was all astir because they thought that Windows Help would be dropped in a few years. That didn't happen. The Windows Help and HTML Help engines are still in the latest Windows. It's just that the Windows Help engine is unchanged from years ago, while HTML Help has forged ahead.

So, if new development does stop on RoboHelp in the near future, then what?

If you're happy with the current X5 version, there is really nothing to be concerned about until Microsoft releases the next version of Windows, code named Longhorn, in late 2006, or the next version of Internet Explorer, which will be IE7. The Longhorn Help engine promises to be a significant leap forward in Help capabilities. If Macromedia patches RoboHelp X5 to work with Longhorn or IE7 and you upgrade to the new Microsoft versions, then you'll need to install the RoboHelp patch. If Macromedia does not patch RoboHelp, then you might want to prolong your Longhorn (or IE) upgrade until you have chosen a replacement tool.

What about right now?

RoboHelp has been around for many years, and Longhorn Help is likely to take us a big step forward as HTML Help did several years ago. It is too early to tell if RoboHelp will adapt to that progression, and it's not useful now to speculate on what Macromedia will eventually do. Basically, there's no reason to stop using RoboHelp if it meets your current needs. However, this summer might be a good time for a needs analysis of your Help requirements so that you will have a decision-making tool ready when the RoboHelp future unfolds.

How do I learn more?

For additional information, the following articles may be useful, and they will also lead you to additional resources:

The Future of RoboHelp, at http://www.winwriters.com/articles/rh/index.html
Stampede! Longhorn on Its Way, at http://stc-phoenix.com/Rough%20Draft_Current/FebMar04_files/toolingaround_febmar04.htm

Likewise, the Help Authoring Tools & Techniques (HATT) list is for online Help authors to share information about online Help tools and techniques. For more information, go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HATT/. Be sure to request the daily digest version so that you are not inundated with 20-30 e-mail messages a day.

The Microsoft Assistance Platform Team for Longhorn has also started a blog on this subject. Go to http://blogs.msdn.com/apblog for more details.

Jim Sands is an independent e-Learning and Help system consultant and writes on technical issues for several professional organizations throughout the country. You can reach him at jsands@help101.org.