Building Enhanced HTML Help with DHTML & CSS

• Building blocks for state-of-the-art online Help with HTML Help, DHTML, and CSS
• Proven methodologies every online Help writer can use immediately
• Interactivity, graphics, indexing, full-text search, and more
• Insights from a pioneer in building enterprise-class HTML Help systems

The first complete guide to state-of-the-art online Help with HTML Help, DHTML, and CSS!

The best way to create Help systems for Windows software is with Microsoft's advanced HTML Help system-and the best way to use HTML Help is to leverage the power of DHTML and Cascading Style Sheets at the same time. Building Enhanced HTML Help with DHTML and CSS shows you how to use all three technologies together. Written by one of the first developers to create an industrial-strength HTML Help system, it delivers proven methodologies and instructions for building world-class help systems with both Web technologies and traditional publishing strategies. The book's step-by-step coverage includes:

• Planning and designing sophisticated online help systems
• Defining, building, and compiling HTML Help projects
• Using HTML Help's advanced, CSS-based graphical look and feel
• Delivering enhanced interactivity through DHTML
• Navigation, cross-referencing, tables of contents, indexing, and more
• Merging modular files into a single online help system

Along the way, Jeannine Klein identifies the most common problems that occur in real-world HTML Help construction-and presents detailed, proven solutions. Whether you're a technical writer, documentation manager, or developer, if you need to deliver the best possible help, Building Enhanced HTML Help with DHTML and CSS is the complete sourcebook you've been looking for.

Contents

1. It's Not Just Help, It's HTML Help Basic ideas & their corollaries.
The corollaries. A note on terminology. The enhanced proposition. A complete process. Basic HTML Help+DHTML+CSS = Enhanced HTML Help. Who should read this book. What you can learn from this book. Limitations. Chapter overviews.

2. So How Does It Work? Process & Product Overview What the process looks like.
Notes on file types & extensions. Planning the system design. Traditional online help decisions. Audience/needs analysis. Organization: reference vs task. Navigation model. Tools. HTML aspects. Compiled or not? Graphical look and feel (CSS). Action & interactivity (DHTML). Directory structure. Crafting reusable elements & templates. Create the reusable elements (graphics, CSS, and DHTML). The graphics. The style sheets (CSS). The dynamic HTML (DHTML). Assemble the templates. Write the individual pages. Creating the HTML Help project. Project definition. Create the project & add its topic files. Specify parameters. Window definition: size & styles. Building the navigation system. Contents. Index. Compiling & testing the project. Merging modular projects. Efficiency. Merging requirements. Setup options. Ensuring compatibility & binary index options. Specifying merge files. Window definitions. Merging references. Preparing merged tables of contents. Using proper cross-file link syntax.

3. Bringing It Together: HTML Topics & Templates Where to author.
HTML Help Editor. HTML Help Image Editor. Designing the templates. Identifying the necessary templates types. Creating reusable elements. Fashioning the graphic elements. Assembling a screen capture library. Writing reusable text. Creating the templates. What it looks like. How it's done. Recipes for common HTML. Basic syntax. Document setup elements. HTML. HEAD. Title. Body. Local formatting tags. Bold & Italic. Code. Font. Center. Break. No Break. Body element tags. Headings. Paragraphs. Images. Anchors. Lists. Bulleted (unordered) lists. Numbered (ordered) lists. Numbered list with bullet sub-items. Definition list. Tables. Table. Table row. Table header/table data. Writing the HTML topic pages. How HTML works with HTML Help-& how it doesn't. Titling tricks. Author beware. Linkages. Background basics. Links within a single CHM. Links between CHMs. External links from the CHM. External links to the CHM.

4. Doing It In Style: CSS (Cascading Style Sheets)What CSS is & what it does.
How to do it. Browser-dependence. Types of cascading style sheets. Linked style sheets. Embedded style sheets. Inline style sheets. Creating the style sheet. Style definition: the basics. The rules of inheritance. Selectors. Class selectors. Pseudo-classes. Contextual selectors. Anatomy of a value. Color values. CSS color names. RGB color values. Hexadecimal values. Browser-safe colors. Spatial values. Absolute: length values. Relative: percentage values. Keywords. Crucial properties for Help. Font properties. font-family. font-size. font-style and font-weight. font-variant. font (shorthand property for font properties). Text & typography properties. text-decoration. vertical-align. text-align. line-height. text-indent. Color & background properties. color. background-color. background-image. background (shorthand property for backgrounds). Box properties (margin, padding, borders). Variants & shorthand versions. padding-top (-right, -left, -bottom), padding. border-top-style (-right-, -left-, -bottom-), border-style. border-top-color (-right-, -left-, -bottom-), border-color. border-top-width (-right-, -left-, -bottom-), border-width. border-top (-right, -left, -bottom), border. margin-top (-right, -left, -bottom), margin. Classification (listing) properties. list-style-type. list-style-image. list-style-position. list-style. Printing properties. page-break-before (-after, -inside). How CSS works with HTML Help-& how it doesn't. Adding the style sheet to the project. Areas of enhancement: fonts. Arenas of conflict: spacing, inheritance, & split files.

5. Making Waves: DHTML (Dynamic HTML) What it is & what it does.
Building a DHTML script. How to do it. Linking to an external script file. Embedding a script file. Adding the external script file to the project. Where to author. Basic script syntax tips. Basic JavaScript terminology. Objects. Properties. Dot notation. Naming objects. Referencing properties. Using "this" as a reference. Variables. Events & event handlers. Functions. Methods. Crucial DHTML elements for HTML Help. Common objects & their properties. window. document. image . anchor < A>. style. all. Date. Common events & event handlers. onClick. onMouseOver. onMouseOut. onLoad. onUnload. CSS properties for DHTML. Index. visibility & display. DHTML recipes for HTML Help. Quick & easy tool tip. Change text color on mouseover. Show/hide text. Status bar explanation of an image map. Open secondary window. Image rollover. Alert message using input from a prompt. How DHTML works with HTML Help-& how it doesn't. Areas of enhancement. Single browser/limited versions. Focused examples. Arenas of conflict. Explicitly adding files to avoid lost paths. Jumping to other topics. Linking to secondary windows. Taking care with positioning elements. Splitting files.

6. Creating Magic: The HTML Help Project File Setting up the project.
The trivial New Project Wizard. Directory structure. File & directory conventions. Using the New Project Wizard. Refining the project. Adding topic & navigation files. To add files to an HTML Help project (in the Workshop):. To add files to an HTML Help project (in Notepad):. Setting project options. Those surreptitious essentials. Dealing with window types. Creating window types. Advanced info: Understanding the project file's window type specs. Fun with hex. Pulling it all together. Save early, save often and close the Workshop. The moment of truth: compiling. Compiling from the command line. Previewing & troubleshooting the results.

7. Navigating the Waters: Table of Contents Choosing the editing environment.
The Workshop's graphical interface. Understanding how the Workshop tabs work. Creating a TOC on the Contents tab. Automatic generation. Understanding how the automatic TOC works. Creating an automatic TOC. Editing automatic TOCs. Manual TOC creation. Basic TOC settings. Setting up the TOC in the Workshop. Setting up the TOC manually. Graphic considerations. Changing the TOC font. Available styles. Binary or not? Perils ahead. The unfixables. TOC workarounds.

8. Out of Many, One: Merging Modular Files What it is & what it does. The HTML Help author's experience. Benefits. Merging requirements. Meeting the requirements efficiently. Procedures for merging. External procedures. Main module settings. Global settings. Perils ahead. General troubleshooting tips. Troubleshooting the TOC.

9. Accelerating Links: Cross-Referencing Options Indexes.
How it works. Binary vs sitemap Index. Location, location, location: Where to put keywords. Setting up an Index. To create a binary Index. To create an Index file (sitemap or binary Index). Troubleshooting Index settings. Cross-references. Available options. To create cross-referencing links. Full-text search. How it works. Search vs Index. Setting up full-text search. To enable full-text search. To create a stop list. Shortcuts. To create a shortcut in a topic file.

10. Making It Happen: Distribution & Installation What it is & what it does.
HHUPD.EXE: The standard approach. Getting the version right. Running HHUPD.EXE. Internet Explorer 5: an alternate approach. Looking ahead: Windows. 2000. Windows 2000. Index.

Index.