Basic Working Procedures > Importing Data > Importing data into existing projects

In addition to creating new projects with imported data you can also import documentation from other formats into existing Help & Manual projects. Here too, an interactive wizard guides you through the steps of the import process, prompting you to enter the necessary settings for importing the data.

The imported topics and chapters are inserted in the current position in the table of contents. This means that you need to select the position in the TOC where you wish to insert the data before you begin.

Productivity Tip

Also see the powerful Snippets function with which you can reuse topics and topic content saved in external files.

1.	Select the Table of Contents section in the Project Explorer and choose the position in your project where you want to insert the imported data. The data will be inserted after the selected topic.

2.	Click on the Application Button and select Import.

3.	Select the documentation format, then follow the instructions displayed in the interactive wizard.

See Settings for importing data for details on settings for individual formats.

You can also import external data directly into individual topics. Note that you should always create a new topic to do this because importing the data overwrites the current topic.

1.	Create a new empty topic or select a topic that you want to overwrite.

2.	Select File > Load Topic from File in Project > Manage Topics and select the file you want to load. You can import HTML, RTF, RVF, TXT files and Help & Manual XML topic files.

If you have the Professional version of Help & Manual you can load topics from other projects directly provided the projects are saved in uncompressed XML format.

For full details on this function see Exporting and importing topics in the Creating and Editing Topics section.

Copying and pasting between projects:

You can also cut, copy and paste topics directly between projects in the Project Explorer. Just open both projects in the explorer and then use the Clipboard functions in the Ribbon to cut, copy and paste entire topics and chapters between the Table of Contents sections of the projects. See Moving, cutting and pasting topics for full details.