1. Tracy Lamb
  2. PowerBuilder
  3. Saturday, 30 July 2022 16:24 PM UTC

Hi all,

Just curious how everyone is incorporating Help Topic in their app.  About 20 years ago, we used RoboHelp, but I haven't maintained it since then... and don't even know where the Help file we created is.   Embarrassing.  Creating and maintaining a Help file was a project almost as big as the product itself.  Kind of like re-creating the whole User Manual, and coordinating with the application programmers to make sure all the links work.  I have the help topic variables set all over the app, but no longer use it. 

On the Main menu, the Help->Help Topics calls of_SendMessage ("pfc_help").

I'm going to disable that on my menu for now until I come up with a good solution for a helpful Help Topic.

~~~Tracy

Accepted Answer
Tracy Lamb Accepted Answer Pending Moderation
  1. Tuesday, 9 August 2022 12:50 PM UTC
  2. PowerBuilder
  3. # Permalink

Thank you all so much for your feedback!

I evaluated both Help+Manual and HelpNDoc.  I decided on HelpNDoc, it's a fraction of the price and looks like it has all the same features.  I'm creating the Help File to match the user manual for the current version.  Once that's done, I'll go back and figure out how to enable context-sensitive help.  For now, I've made all those Help buttons invisible (thank goodness for inheritance!).  One thing that's pretty cool is the ability to mark a Topic as a Favorite, don't know if that's standard practice in modern-day help files... Here's what my Help file looks like right now... the message at the bottom will go away as soon as I pay for HelpNDoc.  Right now I'm using the free version.

Many thanks again.  

~~~Tracy

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  1. mike S
  2. Tuesday, 9 August 2022 14:07 PM UTC
let us know how it goes when you have context sensitive help hooked up.
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  1. Tracy Lamb
  2. Tuesday, 9 August 2022 14:28 PM UTC
Will do!
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Miguel Leeuwe Accepted Answer Pending Moderation
  1. Saturday, 30 July 2022 21:29 PM UTC
  2. PowerBuilder
  3. # 1

Hi Tracey,

There's many formats people use: html, rtf, chm, pdf, just to name a few. 

If you have all the "help topic variables" already set, you still might to be able to take advantage of that, but using a different format. Of course you'll have to redefine each and every one of the pages in the new format. If you have lost the previous help file, then indeed it's going to be quite a job.

Maybe a commercially interesting alternative is to create some user courses/introductions, instead of providing a help file. (personally I think that any application should have its help files, but some people don't agree on that and try to sell what should be included in the product) :)

best regards,

MiguelL

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  1. Tracy Lamb
  2. Saturday, 30 July 2022 21:50 PM UTC
Thank Miguel...

We invested a lot of time and money in our RoboHelp solution... I don't know if anyone ever used it! The application is pretty big, but very simple and intuitive to use. Most of it at least... lol! At some point, someone should understand a little about relational databases to understand how the underlying tables are all connected to create the data in the windows they use. I've found most people won't read the User Manual! They'd rather send me an email or give me a call if they have a question. Lol!
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  1. Miguel Leeuwe
  2. Saturday, 30 July 2022 22:08 PM UTC
ah ok, so if you still have the contents somewhere in the database not all is lost!
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  1. Andreas Mykonios
  2. Monday, 1 August 2022 09:13 AM UTC
Hi Tracy. It's true that many times users do not read manuals. I've also done that. The question is why this happens? There may be lot of answers. Some of them: they don't know there is a manual or help file, they don't know how to use help files, they prefer someone to explain them how to do some tasks.

One thing that I seen other people doing (and I also try to do) is to use the help files and the documentation during trainings. This may be an important step that may change people's attitude about documentation.

Andreas.
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Chris Pollach @Appeon Accepted Answer Pending Moderation
  1. Saturday, 30 July 2022 22:54 PM UTC
  2. PowerBuilder
  3. # 2

Hi Tracy;

  I used to use RoboHelp as well. A great tool in it's day for .HLP help file production. Then I switched to .CHM. Today though I use one of two approaches.

#1:  use plain HTML stored on the web server & grab it via the PB Apps using either the INet object or the newer built-in PB Web Browser control. I like plain HTML now because is easily fully searchable by any web browser or related control by the App User.

 #2: The other tact that I have used over the past decade is to produce the App help as a PDF file. Then store this in the DB or again on a Web Server. Then use the iNet object or as of late the built-in PB Web Browser control to display the PDF help. Once again, PDF's are indexable & searchable by the App user.

The  above two techniques also allowed me to centralize the App Help so that I can have one central place to deploy/update the App help. These approaches also work well with PowerClient & PowerServer based applications. Both HTML & PDF files are easily produced as well from today's word processing software products.

Food for thought. HTH 

Regards... Chris 

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mike S Accepted Answer Pending Moderation
  1. Sunday, 31 July 2022 15:11 PM UTC
  2. PowerBuilder
  3. # 3

>>I have the help topic variables set all over the app, but no longer use it. 

we use help&manual , which is similar to robohelp.  It allows you to create help as either chm, html, pdf, hlp and other formats.  We mainly use chm , html and pdf formats.  Its great way to write the help and be able to generate it in multiple formats depending on what you need.   You can also include links to videos and other things (file or URL) too.

 

We use the window title as the way to have the help context sensitive.  when a user hits F1, the system grabs the current window title, strips out spaces and other characters that aren't allowed as the topic id, and that is typically the help topic.  We also have a mapping feature that looks up the object.windowname to see if there is a more specific help topic setup for the current object rather than a window.  This allows the help writer to do all the work without a developer.    

 

our support uses the help file when a customer calls up asking a question about how something works.   This makes sure the help is correct and clear. And it also reinforces with the customer that they could have had an immediate answer if they pressed F1.  Our approach is to tell the customer when they ask a question:  'Ok, lets press F1 and see what help says' then they read the help to them.   Improving help is constant, sometimes it is out of date, sometimes it isn't as clear as it could be.   Sometimes it forces us to change things in the application to make it clearer so help isn't as needed.  Our support calls have dropped a lot over the years as help improved.

and yes, some customers will call no matter how clear the screen/error message/help is.  

 

 

 

Comment
  1. Daniel Vivier
  2. Saturday, 6 August 2022 19:06 PM UTC
We also use Help&Manual, and really like it. I love that I can generate a .CHM for context-sensitive Help, a PDF for a full manual, and an HTML website version that allows us to send links to specific pages as part of tech support answers, all from the same source.

Virtually every window in our applications has a Help button on it, that takes you to the appropriate page in the .CHM version, which of course comes up very quickly because it's locally installed (unlike solutions that retrieve pages from web-based help etc.). Hopefully the presence of those Help buttons helps users see the availability of help and contact us less with questions easily answered in the help!
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Olan Knight Accepted Answer Pending Moderation
  1. Sunday, 31 July 2022 19:36 PM UTC
  2. PowerBuilder
  3. # 4

If you can find the CHM help file, you can use it. This is what we did and it works well.

https://iristech.co/winhlp32-exe-on-windows-10/

 

Comment
  1. Olan Knight
  2. Monday, 1 August 2022 19:15 PM UTC
Does the company have any backups? Maybe tape? OR OneDrive?

How about an older version of the Source Control being used? Perhaps that file would be in Source Control.

Otherwise.... sorry! :(
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  1. Tracy Lamb
  2. Tuesday, 9 August 2022 12:31 PM UTC
Turns out our help files are HLP files generated with RoboHelp. Very old... 7/13/1999 !!!
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  1. Roland Smith
  2. Tuesday, 9 August 2022 13:12 PM UTC
Olan's link is for an installer that restores the ability to view HLP files.
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Andreas Mykonios Accepted Answer Pending Moderation
  1. Monday, 1 August 2022 09:06 AM UTC
  2. PowerBuilder
  3. # 5

Hi Tracy.

I did used in the past HelpMaker which is discontinued. After that I've used two tools: HelpNDoc (you need to pay to use it in your business but I believe it's affordable), Precision Helper which is free.

HelpNDoc: Really easy to use. Great support. Has some great functionalities like conversion from existing HLP or CHM files to a HelpNDoc project. That means that if you have your original HLP files, then you can reuse almost all of their contents (even in windows 10). Writing contents and topics is pretty much as easy as writing a word document. Generates CHM, PDF, WebHelp sites and many other (like ebooks etc).

Precision Helper: I do like very much that tool. It's free and it's pretty simple. But you must have some html knowledge to write your content. It's really powerful. While in my previous work, they did own a HelpNDoc license, I did preferred using Precision Helper. Precision Helper allows you to create projects from existing CHM files, but has no support for HLP files. You can generate CHM, RTF, PDF (using distiller - not directly), ebooks (with some additional tools that I'm not sure if they are easy to find), WebHelp (this implementation, in my opinion, is better than the one provided by HelpNDoc).

If you need any additional information for one of those products let me know.

Andreas.

Comment
  1. Andreas Mykonios
  2. Monday, 1 August 2022 13:52 PM UTC
I've never evaluated help&manual. But I do see that they are some difference mostly related to vs integration. The best thing you have to do is to compare help&manual trial with helpndoc personal edition.

Andreas.
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  1. Brad Mettee
  2. Monday, 1 August 2022 16:23 PM UTC
We use HelpNDoc here too, and it's quite easy to use, and converts from existing help files well. It's definitely worth the free download for testing (which can be converted to paid easily).



Once purchased, it'll keep running forever. The yearly cost is for downloading updates and new versions of it.
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  1. mike S
  2. Monday, 1 August 2022 16:37 PM UTC
and a few others that are reasonable priced:

https://www.helpsmith.com/

https://www.drexplain.com/



IMO, you will want to have chm, html, and pdf generation options
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PowerObject ! Accepted Answer Pending Moderation
  1. Thursday, 4 August 2022 00:50 AM UTC
  2. PowerBuilder
  3. # 6

You could point your Help link to SharePoint where help content is hosted - created/maintained by Product Owner and BAs using HTML, images, videos, etc. You can use just one link that always takes the user to the Help home where they can browse or search help or you could use individual page links for each topic. This way, help content evolves continuously without developers' intervention/efforts and users can read/learn about the application even outside the application by simply surfing to Help hosted on SharePoint from anywhere. You could even parameterize the base URL and links to various help sections (if they ever change, just change them in the INI file and redeploy the INI file - or maintain the URLs in a table).

Comment
  1. Tracy Lamb
  2. Tuesday, 9 August 2022 12:28 PM UTC
This sounds like a good idea, but I don't have a SharePoint server.
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Tracy Lamb Accepted Answer Pending Moderation
  1. Saturday, 13 August 2022 22:03 PM UTC
  2. PowerBuilder
  3. # 7

Update... providing Context Sensitive Help.

In most of my response windows, I've got a Help button.  The root-level ancestor (wa_response) has the following code behind the Help button:

SetPointer(HourGlass!)
ShowHelp(gs_helpfile,KeyWord!,is_keyword)

In the window's Open Event, I set is_keyword to whatever is appropriate for the window.  As long as I have a corresponding Keyword defined in HelpNDoc, the Help button opens to the appropriate topic.  If I don't have a Keyword defined, HelpNDoc opens with the general index.  Works like a charm!

~~~Tracy

 

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