Mini-TOC Proxy

A Mini-TOC proxy lets you generate a portion of your table of contents (TOC) or topic headings at a particular location in the output. A Mini-TOC proxy can be used for both online and print-based output. For online output, you can insert a Mini-TOC proxy into a template page or a topic. For print-based output formats, you can insert a Mini-TOC proxy into any topic where you want to generate a small TOC. For example, let's say you want the first page of each chapter in a manual to start out with a small TOC, showing the page numbers where subheadings occur within that chapter. In that case, you can insert a Mini-TOC proxy into each topic that you plan to use as the beginning of each chapter. If you insert the proxy into a template page, each topic using that template page will have a mini-TOC. If you insert the proxy into certain topics only, mini-TOCs will be generated only within those particular topics.

Example—Online Output

Example—Print Output

[Menu Proxy — Headings — Online — Depth3 ]

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How to Insert a Mini-TOC Proxy

  1. Open a project, and select the Workspace tab at the top.

  2. On the left, navigate to a template page file, which is usually located under Resources > TemplatePages. The file contents display on the right.

  3. Place your cursor where you want to insert the proxy.

  4. In the toolbar, click and select Mini-TOC Proxy.

  5. (Optional) From the TOC Depth field, select a number to dictate the depth of the mini-TOC.

    For example, if the proxy is intended for print output and you want the mini-TOC to be based on heading levels in the topics, you might place the proxy after an h1 heading and select 4 as the depth. In that case, the proxy will include headings that are using h2, h3, and h4 styles (but not h5 or h6).

  6. (Optional) If you want to select a specific style class of the MadCap:miniTocProxy style to control its look and feel, you can enter it in the Stylesheet class field. If you do not enter a style class, Flare Online will use the main MadCap:miniTocProxy style automatically. For more details about styles, see the Flare Desktop Help system.

  7. Click Insert. The proxy is added, represented by a gray rectangle.

How It Works

How does Flare Online decide which topic links to include in a mini-TOC? It works a bit differently for online output than it does for print-based output.

Print-Based Output

By default the mini-TOC for print output is based on the h1 through h6 styles that you have applied to content in your topics. When you insert the proxy, you select a number for the heading depth. This number refers to the absolute heading level. For example, if you place the proxy after an h1 heading and select 4 as the depth, the proxy will include headings that are using h2, h3, and h4 styles (but not h5 or h6). If you place the proxy after an h2 heading with 4 as the depth, the proxy will include the h3 and h4 styles only. Please note that the print mini-TOC created from the proxy is not necessarily based on the structure of your outline TOC (i.e., the file found in the TOCs folder). However, in Flare Desktop there is a switch on the Advanced tab in the Target Editor that lets you base the generated mini-TOC on the structure of your outline TOC.

Online Output

For online output, the depth refers to the number of sub-levels found under that topic in the TOC file.

Let's say you place the proxy in a topic that is located on the first level in a TOC, with three levels of topics below it, like this:

With a depth of 3, all three levels of topics will be included in the mini-TOC in online output, even if those topics happen to start with an h1 heading.