When you “Refresh References” on a map (F11, or possibly when the map is opened depending on settings in Tools > DITA Options) it populates the @navtitle for (by pulling in the text from the topic's ) and then displays that value using a CSS :before selector. This feature is working as designed since when @locktitle is not set or it is set to “no” the @navtitle is not supposed to be used for output. Refresh references in this case is populating the @navtitle as a “navigation aid” (to help you author your map) and truncating the text is also by design (questionable perhaps, as I don't see the real benefit, but it was done on purpose).</p>
<p>So, the real problem here seems to be that WebHelp output is not respecting @locktitle. It is only when @navtitle is set to “yes” that output processors (like the DITA OT) are supposed to use @navtitle. When it is not set, or set to “no”, then @navtitle is supposed to be ignored and the content of the topic's is supposed to be pulled in. If you compare the “Multiple HTML files” deliverable with “WebHelp” then you will see what I mean as it will put the proper text into its ToC page.</p>
<p>The fix would need to be done in the WebHelp plug-in. I'll file that as a defect.</p>
<p>I can't think of any good workarounds that include modifying your content. The only one that might work would be to set @locktitle to “yes” and then put the full title into @navtitle (this isn't really 'good' but perhaps not too harmful). However, then you'd need to remember you locked these titles and to update them if you modify the in the corresponding topic. Alternatively, you could dial down the “refresh references” feature and then leave @locktitle unset, but then also manually modify @navtitle. The only benefit here is that you could then fully enable refresh references again if you made changes to get modified titles pulled in so that you can more easily identify them (at which point any long ones would need to be manually fixed again).
Reply
Derek Read August 16, 2012 at 11:01 pm
