Using JBuilder's Online Help
JBuilder displays online help topics in the Help Viewer. Topics can also be displayed in the AppBrowser or in a web browser. Choose one of the following topics for detailed information about JBuilder's Help system:
How to get Help
There are several ways to get help on a topic when you are using JBuilder:
- From the Help Viewer:
- Choose Help|Help Topics from the JBuilder main menu to open the Help Viewer.
- Click the Help button shown on a dialog box, or press F1.
- From the IDE:
- Highlight a menu item on a pulldown menu without activating the item and press F1.
- Choose Search|Browse Symbol and enter a class name. Click the Doc tab.
- From the AppBrowser:
- Double-click a class name in the Structure pane and click the Doc tab to see the reference documentation for the class.
- Click a class in the Structure pane and press Enter to see the reference documentation for the referenced class (whatever is extended or implemented by the selected class). For more information, see Drilling down into other classes and interfaces.
- Right-click a class name in the Source pane and choose Browse Symbol at Cursor. Click the Doc tab.
- From the Inspector:
- Choose a property or event and press F1.
The main parts of the Help Viewer
The JBuilder Help Viewer includes the following:
- The Available Books drop down list, which shows the current book title and enables you to select another book.
- The Contents page, which displays an expandable Table of Contents for the current book.
- The Book Index page, which shows the index entries for the current book only.
- The Master Index page, which shows the combined index entries for all books.
- The Content pane, which displays the text of the selected topic.
- The following buttons:
Button |
Name |
Description |
 |
Home |
Goes to the first topic in the history list. |
 |
Previous |
Goes to the previous topic in the history list. |
 |
Next |
Goes to the next topic in the history list. |
.
 |
Print |
Prints the current topic. |
 |
Find |
Finds text in the current page of the Help Viewer. |
 |
Copy |
Copies the current topic. |
Using the Help Viewer
Choose one of the following topics for information on using the Help Viewer:
Using the Table of Contents
To choose a topic from the Table of Contents:
- Select a book from the Available Books drop down list. (The Table of Contents for that book displays on the Contents page.)
- Click an item in the Table of Contents to go to that topic.
Using the Index
To look up a topic in the Book Index or the Master Index,
- Click the Book Index or Master Index tab at the bottom of the Help Viewer.
- In the text field below the book list, start typing the words to find.
As you start typing, the index scrolls, doing an incremental search on the index entries to find the closest match.
- Double-click the index entry for the topic you want.
If there is more than one topic for the selected index entry, the Topics Found dialog is displayed with the list of matching topics. Choose the topic you want and click Display.
To limit the word choice to a single book, select a book from the Available Books drop down list and click the Book Index tab.
The Master Index currently includes the following books:
- Getting Started with JBuilder
- Creating JavaBeans with BeansExpress
- Getting Started with Java
- Building Applications with JBuilder
- Component Writer's Guide
- Database Application Developer's Guide
- Distributed Applications Developer's Guide
- JBCL Reference
- Borland Deployment Server for Java User's Guide
- The Java Language Specification
- JDK Documentation
- JFC 1.1 (Swing) Documentation
- Additional third-party documentation
Check more than one index if you're doing a global search for a topic. For example, you could check:
- The Master Index.
- The Book Index for the JBCL Reference.
- The regular HTML indexes for the JBCL and JDK books.
Searching for text in the current page
To find text in the current page of the Help Viewer, click the Find button
in the Help Viewer. (Pressing Alt+F or F3 searches in the AppBrowser, not in the Help Viewer.)
Copying text from the Help Viewer
To copy selected text from Help Viewer, click the Copy button
in the Help Viewer, rather than pressing Ctrl+C.
Navigating in the Help Viewer
The following table describes how to move around in the Help Viewer:
To |
Do this... |
|
Change books |
Click the down arrow in the Available Books drop down list and select a book. |
Go to a topic shown in the Table of Contents |
Click the topic title. |
Find (search for) text in the current page |
Click the Find button . (Pressing Alt+F or F3 searches in the AppBrowser, not in the Help Viewer.) |
Expand or collapse a section of the Table of Contents |
Click the + or - beside a topic on the Contents page. |
Expand or collapse all sections of the Table of Contents |
Right-click in the Contents page and choose Expand All Topics or Collapse All Topics. |
Follow a hypertext link underlined in the text |
Click the link in the text. |
Return to the previous topic in the history list |
Click the Previous button . |
Go to the next topic in the history list |
Click the Next button . |
Go to the first topic in the history list |
Click the Home button . |
Using the keyboard for scrolling
When you select an entry in the Contents, Book Index, or Master Index pages of the Help Viewer, the keyboard focus stays there. Navigation keys (such as PageDown) continue to scroll the left side of the Help Viewer rather than the Content pane on the right side.
To apply the navigation keys to the Content pane, do any of the following,
- Click the Content pane, then click another window such as the JBuilder Main window. Click the Content pane again.
- Press Alt+Tab twice.
- Click the Find button
, then press the Escape key.
The line around the viewing area changes from light gray to black, indicating that you can use the navigation keys to scroll the right pane.
Viewing class reference documentation
You can view API Reference documentation for a class in the AppBrowser, the Help Viewer, or a web browser.
To display reference documentation in the AppBrowser, do one of the following:
- Double-click a class name in the Structure pane to display source code for that class in the Source pane. Click the Doc tab to view the documentation for that class.
- In the Source pane, right-click a class name, such as Frame, and choose Browse Symbol At Cursor. The source for that class appears. Click the Doc tab to see the documentation for that class.
- Choose Search|Browse Symbol, and enter a class name. Click the Doc tab to see the documentation for that class.
In order for the class documentation to be found, the import statements at the top of your source file must point to the desired class. If the message Java Symbol Not Found
is displayed, navigate to a source file that imports the desired class.
To return to your source code, click the Project tab and click the Home button
in the upper left. To see the documentation again, click the Next button
.
To display API Reference files in the Help Viewer, do one of the following:
- In the Shortcuts page of the Help Viewer, click a Reference link.
- In the JBuilder Main window, choose Help|Java Reference or Help|JBCL Reference.
- In the Available Books drop down list of the Help Viewer, choose JBCL Reference, JDK Documentation, or JFC 1.1 (Swing) Documentation.
Looking for a category of classes
Suppose you want to find the reference pages for formatter or matrix classes, but don't know what package they are in. To look for a category of classes,
- In the Available Books drop down list of the Help Viewer, choose JBCL Reference, JDK Documentation, or JFC 1.1 (Swing) Documentation.
- Choose the Class Hierarchy link at the top of the Content pane.
- Click the Find button
in the upper left of the Help Viewer.
- Enter the category of class you want to find and press Find Next.
Using the API Reference indexes
The JBCL index can be viewed using the Book Index or Master Index pages of the Help Viewer, or as a javadoc-style HTML file.
- The JBCL index shown in the Book or Master Index pages of the Help Viewer is preferred, because it has some general category entries from the high-level package files. This approach also provides incremental search.
- The JBCL index, which is delivered as a regular HTML file, is like the JDK index and contains auto-generated entries only. This index is available from within a web browser. It is accessed using the Index link in the upper-right of the JBCL high-level package pages.
The indexes that are delivered as regular HTML files are broken up per letter, for fast loading. Per-letter versions of HTML-based indexes are provided for the following online books:
- JBCL Reference
- JDK Documentation
- JFC 1.1 (Swing) Documentation
- Java Language Specification
- JGL Documentation
In case you need to do a cross-alphabet search, a long plain-text version is also provided.
To look up a property in the index for the JBCL Reference book, see the topic called Looking up properties in the JBCL Reference.
The layout of the JBCL Reference pages
Each reference entry in the JBCL Reference shows not only the methods and fields (variables) that are defined within that class or interface, but also lists the ones inherited by that class or interface. These lists of available methods and fields enable you to jump directly to the associated documentation.
The JBCL Reference page for a class or interface has the following sections:
- Inheritance tree, including subclasses
- About this class
- Lists of all methods and fields (variables) available for this class or interface
- Variables implemented in this class or interface
- Constructors implemented in this class or interface
- Properties implemented in this class or interface
- Methods implemented in this class or interface
- Events
Looking up properties in the JBCL Reference
Simple properties are listed in the Properties section of each file in the JBCL Reference. A simple property is one where its write accessor ("setter"), if it has one, takes a single parameter and returns nothing. If it has a read accessor (prefaced with "get" or "is"), it takes no parameters and returns a value.
To look up simple properties in a class file, use the short property name without the "get", "set" or "is" prefix. For example, look for the image property in the properties section of the ButtonControl component for the following getter/setter pair of signatures:
getImage()
setImage(java.awt.Image)
To locate this property in the JBCL Reference Book Index, look for the index entry "image:ButtonControl component".
In many cases, methods exist that do not follow the rules for a simple property, but which also manipulate a property. Often, these additional methods supplement the functionality of corresponding simple properties. These are found in the Methods section in the class file, under the full method name where applicable. In the JBCL Reference Book Index, these methods are also included by their full names. The following example is a method from the ButtonControl component that falls in this category:
setImage(java.awt.Image, java.lang.String)
This method is found in the Methods section of the ButtonControl reference documentation file under setImage(java.awt.Image, java.lang.String)
. In the JBCL Reference Book Index, this method is indexed under "setImage:ButtonControl component".
Adding entries to the Shortcuts page
To add a link to the Shortcuts page that appears when you choose Help|Help Topics, you must know the destination URL, relative to the Shortcuts page. You can find this by unzipping the documentation set or looking in the documentation zip file, as above. Add the desired URL into the shortcuts file. The shortcuts file is: jbuilder\doc\borland\gettingstarted\shortcuts.html
For example, you could add the lines:
<P>
<A HREF="kclassic.html#classic debugger">Borland Classic keymapping for debugging</A><BR>
This example URL is constructed from the following main elements, which you need to determine for your desired topic:
- <A HREF="../ + the book's directory + /
- The file name
- # + the anchor name (without this element, it defaults to top-of-page) + ">
- The topic heading, or your custom description + </A >
If you have unzipped the documentation files, you can use a text search utility to quickly determine which HTML file contains the topic you are looking for.
Most jumps to files on regular file servers are supported, such as the following example for a K: drive:
<P>
<A HREF="file:///K|/my documents/test/testfile.html#my topic">JBuilder Tips and Tricks</A><BR>
When you leave the Shortcuts page and return to it again, the Shortcuts page is reloaded, showing your additional jump.