Adding Custom Helper Applications to the WebCD

WebCD Globe Adding Custom Helper Applications to the WebCD

To make sure the content of your WebCD is 100% viewable, you may need to include custom Helper applications to accommodate any files you have included on the WebCD that require special viewers. The Adobe Acrobat^TM Reader and Apple QuickTime^TM Movie Player can be included automatically by selecting the application from the Helpers Options dialog (see Adding Helper Applications to the WebCD ).

The method described below accommodates custom helper or viewer applications that can run directly off the CD-ROM. If your helper application needs to run a setup program, MarketScapeÆs Service Group can include custom viewers onto your WebCD. Call 1-888-GO-WEBCD for more information. The best way to determine the helper program can run directly off the CD is to test running the helper executable without installing it. Usually a self-contained executable that does not require components installed in the Windows directory or special registry entries probably can run directly off a CD-ROM.

Steps to add a custom helper application

In the steps below, descriptions use the Image folder for the WebCD Viewer image. The Image folder is located, by default, beneath your projectÆs folder. If you placed the WebCD Viewer image into a different folder (specified on the Build Wizard: Destination Dialog ), substitute that folder name for the "Image" folder in the descriptions below.

1 Copy all required files to an appropriately named subfolder in the Image folder (or other folder to which you have written or intend to write the WebCD Viewer image). Choose a subfolder that does not disturb the default directory structure. A suggested directory structure would be:
. . .\Image\Helpers\Appdir
where Appdir is the subdirectory for your helper application files. The Helpers folder is required to hold the helpers.ini file you will create in step 3 below.
Note The Helpers folder and helper application subfolder can be created before or after you have built the WebCD Viewer image to hard disk. The build will not disturb existing folders in the Image folder.

2 For maximum compatibility across multiple platforms, if the custom viewer files contain long file names, rename files to the 8.3 ISO 9660 Level 1 standard file naming format. This also facilitates replication.

3 Create the helpers.ini file. This file must be located in a folder called Helpers directly below your Image folder. The helpers.ini file should have the following format:
[Helper1]
Name = Name of helper
Exe = The relative path name of the exe on the CD
Ext = The file extension of the type of files that this helper application uses
Mime = The mime type of the type of files that this helper application uses
Win95 = 1 or 0 (1 if this helper applications runs on Windows 95)
Win31 = 1 or 0 (1 if this helper applications runs on Windows 3.1 platform)
WinNT = 1 or 0 (1 if this helper applications runs on Windows NT
Create a [Helpern] section for each helper application, where n is 1 through 5, for a maximum of five helper applications.
Name is a mandatory entry.
Exe is the relative path name of the helper application.
For example, if you placed the helper application in the
. . .\Image\Helpers\Helper1\
folder, and the name of your helper executable is Viewer.exe, then the Exe entry should be:
Exe = Helper1\Viewer.exe
DO NOT place a slash in front of the relative path specification in the Exe entry.
Ext is the file extension of the type of files that the helper can handle. For example: Ext = TIF.
Mime is used to setup the Netscape Navigator browser. For example: Mime = application/tiff.
Win95, Win31, WinNT entries are optional, if the entry does not exist, the setting defaults to zero (0).

The WebCD viewer will make the appropriate registry settings so that the helper can run off the CD.

Note When custom viewers have been included, do not use the Build directly from the current project option on the Build Wizard: WebCD Source dialog. If you build directly from the current project, the Helpers.ini will not be acknowledged.