Publishing > PDF and Printed Manuals

Before you generate a PDF file you will probably want to modify one of the standard print manual templates supplied with Help & Manual for your own needs. These standard templates provide a basic framework for your user manuals and PDF documents but they contain a number of elements which you will want to change, like the contents of the cover page and introduction and so on.

Key Information

A maximum of 6 TOC levels are supported in PDF files. If you have more levels than this (which is not recommended) they will all be displayed on the same level of the published TOC. Levels below level 6 will not have headings in the body of your text.

Follow the instructions in Using PDF templates to create or edit a PDF print manual template.

Once you have created a personalized print manual template you can use it as often as you like, both for your current project and for other projects.

It's a good idea to store your edited template in your project directory. This keeps all the files associated with your project together and makes your project more portable.

Open your project and go to Configuration > Publishing Options > Adobe PDF in the Project Explorer to configure the export settings for Adobe PDF. All these settings only need to be set once for your project. Any changes you make are stored automatically, including the selection of a print manual template to be used for PDF export.

2.	In the PDF Layout section select the template you edited in Step 1. Use the button to navigate to the template file, which has the extension .mnl.

See Adobe PDF settings in the Reference section for details on the other available settings.

Go to View > Program Options > PDF Export and check your reference device for PDF output.

If you are not using EMF or WMF graphics you will get the best results by setting the screen device. Otherwise you need to use a printer driver, which does not have to be the driver for a printer physically connected to your computer.

If you experience any problems with your PDF output they may be caused by proprietary printer drivers. If this happens try installing a standard driver for a common printer like a LaserJet or a DeskJet from the Windows CD. Then select this driver as your reference device in the PDF Export tab.

If you use rare fonts in your project you should make sure that those fonts are embedded in your PDF file, otherwise they will not be displayed on computers where they are not installed. However, note that this will significantly increase the size of your PDF file, so using rare fonts should generally be avoided wherever possible!

By default Help & Manual automatically embeds all fonts except a list of standard fonts. To check this exclusion list go to Configuration > Publishing Options > Adobe PDF Output > Font Embedding.

Select Project > Publish, and select Adobe PDF as your publishing format.

See Publishing Your Projects for more details on publishing.