OS/2 Shareware BBS: 5 Edit/05-Edit.zip/nview133.zip/newview.INF

OS/2 Help File | 2001-11-04 | 15KB | 317 lines

ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ 1. Introduction ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ

 Welcome to NewView!

NewView is a replacement for the original OS/2 Help Viewer, View.exe.

It improves upon many aspects of View, with a modern, easy to use interface,
more options, and new features that View simply didn't have.

For more advertising, see the readme.txt that comes with NewView. This helpfile
is here to explain the tedious details of using the program. So lets go!

-------

NewView is Copyright 2001 Aaron Lawrence. It is also licensed under the GNU
Public License, which means you have the right to obtain the source code.

If you have comments, compliments, suggestions or ... OK... bugs, you can talk
to me:

  [e-mail].

Please be specific: you need to include:

o NewView version number (Help - About)

o What you were doing at the time

o Status bar text, if any

o What help file was being loaded, and where I can find/download it if
posssible

o What variety of OS/2 you're running.

Also make sure you've read readme.txt for features that aren't supported - I
obviously already know about those problems! However, votes in favour of
implementing particular features are welcome, as they help to prioritise
development.

If you want to help with NewView development, you should be able to download
the latest source code from http://hobbes.nmsu.edu or else, you can contact me.
NewView is written with Speedsoft Sibyl (http://www.speedsoft-online.de), a
Delphi clone for OS/2.


ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ 2. Installation ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ

Installing NewView

NewView does not currently have an install program (this is just laziness on my
behalf :).

However the procedure is very simple. Simply put NewView.exe in a directory,
preferably one that is in the path. It doesn't use any DLLs or OS/2 INI
settings or Workplace Shell features.

It creates a text INI file in it's own directory to save settings; it also
creates text .NTE and .BMK files for Notes and Bookmarks, in the same directory
as your help files (but only if you actually create any Notes or Bookmarks).

Making NewView your default Help reader

The easiest way to do this is:

1. Go to C:\os2
2. Copy View.exe to OldView.exe
This makes a backup. Do NOT rename View.exe or OS/2 will detect the change and
make help files use OldView.exe!
3. Copy NewView.exe to View.exe.

The reason for doing this, rather than changing OS/2 File Associations (apart
from the fact that it is quite difficult to change associations) is that many
help file icons are installed as program objects, pointing to View.exe
explicitly, with parameters for the file to load.

What about online (application) help?

Right now, NewView simply does not do this. I have had no particular insight
into how I would do this either, since it is basically part of Presentation
Manager (the OS/2 windowing system).


ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ 3. Using NewVIew ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ

Using NewView

Broadly speaking, NewView does the same things as View does.

To find topics, you can search, read the table of contents or use the
alphabetical index.

To simply read the help file like a paper book, use the "Previous"  and "Next"
buttons to work your way through all the topics.

You can also use the help file like web pages, using "Back"  and "Forward"
buttons to go back to wherever you were before, or to retread you steps.

Colours and some of the behaviour of NewView can be adjusted from the "Options"
dialog (Tools - Options menu).

You can also annotate or bookmark topics.

Why doesn't my help file work properly?

NewView is a work in progress.

Some of the less used features of View are not yet implemented. This is either
because I have not got around to it, or because they are simply not worth the
time. Examples include image maps (hyperlinked graphics)*, metafiles, index
synonyms, the entire application control API, and so on.

Unfortunately, it seems that at least one developer has used every one of these
features, so you may find an occasional file that doesn't load or doesn't work
properly.

Over time, more features may be added when they seem worthwhile, but there is
no guarantee. Your votes count! Send them to [e-mail].

------

* Hyperlinked graphics with a single link for the whole picture, will now work
in NewView.


ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ 3.1. Loading files ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ

Loading Helpfiles

To open a help file, you can:

- Double-click a help icon that is already set up, or

- Type "NewView filename" from the command line, or

- Click the Open button  from within NewView, or

- Reload a recently viewed file from the "File" menu of NewView.

Once the file is loaded, you should see the table of contents and the first
topic.

Like View, NewView can load multiple files at once, presenting them as if they
were one book, and read environment variables for filenames. This makes it
compatible with such things as the OS/2 Developers Toolkit documentation.

For example
 NewView cpref
loads the "Control Program Guide and Reference". CPREF is an environment
variable set in config.sys, consisting of "CP1+CP2+CP3" which tells NewView (or
View) to load the help files CP1, CP2 and CP3. Because there is no path
supplied, the files are searched for in path specified by the BOOKSHELF
variable.*

The files are all loaded and effectively appended to each other, in the order
specified on the command line.

The reason for splitting help files like this escapes me, but the IPF help
suggests that it was so you could fit each part on a single floppy.

Being able to load multiple files like this can occasionally be helpful for
other reasons. For example, 4OS/2 (a CMD.EXE replacement) uses it to add it's
own help on top of the original CMD help. You can do it yourself with any files
you like, perhaps because you use both together.

You can also load multiple files with the GUI - use ctrl or shift to select
multiple files.


ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ 3.2. Contents view ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ

Table of Contents

Most help files have a table of contents that shows you the topics in the file,
in a hierarchy or "tree". This is usually the first view you see when you open
a file.

You can expand or collapse branches on the tree by clicking the + or - buttons,
or using the space bar.

To view a topic from the contents, just click on it. You can also move through
the contents by using the arrow keys.

To move through *all* topics in the contents tree, in order, you can use Ctrl +
Up and Ctrl + Down, or the "Previous"  and "Next"  buttons. This is one way to
treat the file as a normal book, reading through each page.

You can also review the whole table of contents by using "Expand All" in the
"View" menu. This expands all the branches of the contents table so you can
quickly look through it. However, it's usually easier to use Search or Index
for this purpose.


ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ 3.3. Search ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ

About Search

Searching is a quick way to find information, when you don't know where to
start. Simply go to the Search tab, type some related words and click the
Search button. You'll see a listing of all topics containing that word, or
words like it, with the best matches at the top.

You can also search "all" help files on your system using "Tools" - "Search all
Help Files". This search works similarly to searching within a file, but it
presents results categorised by what help file they were found in.

Note: This search may not include all help files on your system. Only the paths
defined by BOOKSHELF and HELP environment variables are searched. Of course,
NewView could potentially search your whole hard drive, but that could be very
slow and is usually not necessary. Your thoughts on this topic are welcome.

Notes

NewView offers generous matching capabilities, including partial word matches
(starting, or containing). Technically, View can do similar things using
wildcards (*) but most people don't know this, or if they do they don't
remember it when doing a search ;-)

There is one significant problem with the current search features: "words" that
include numbers or symbols - such as "es4004" will not be found. This is
because View breaks those up into pieces (numbers, alphabetic, symbols). I have
a method to solve this, but haven't implemented it.

It's also possible that occasionally words will be missed from searches. This
is because I don't have full documentation on the search table in INF files,
and there may be a few cases that I haven't worked out. I don't have any way to
improve in this area.


ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ 3.4. Index ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ

About the Index

The Index tab contains an alphabetical listing of topics or keywords in the
help file. You can quickly search through it just by typing the first few
characters of the word you want to look up. NewView jumps to the first match in
the index automatically.

Notes

Help files may or may not include an "official" index. The index is manually
created by the author, so (for original View) it's usefulness is strictly
dependent on how much work the author put into it. There may not even be one.

However, a useful index can be provided simply by listing the titles of each
topic alphabetically, and this is what NewView does. It then merges the
original index (if any) with the list of topic titles.

If for some reason you don't like this, you can turn it off in "File" -
"Options" - General tab.


ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ 3.5. Notes ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ

Adding and Using Notes

NewView allows you to add notes (annotations) to your help files.

To add a note, simply click where you want to make a note and click the "Note"
button , then type your text and press enter. The text will be inserted in red
into the help topic.

To edit or delete a note, click on the red note text; you can then edit the
note text, or click on delete to get rid of it.

You can also review all the notes that you've made in the current help file(s)
by going to the Notes tab; this allows you to add, edit and delete, and also
jump to the topics containing your notes.

Notes are saved in a file with the extension .nte, in the same directory as the
help file they are for.

Note - if a help file is changed (for example a program is upgraded) then notes
will no longer appear in the correct place; however, you can still read them
from the Notes tab.


ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ 3.6. Bookmarks ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ

Bookmarks

NewView allows you to bookmark particular topics within the current help file.
Simply click the bookmark button  to add the current topic as a bookmark.

To jump to a bookmark, go to the "Bookmarks" menu, and click on the bookmark
you want to open.

You can view or delete all your bookmarks by clicking on "Edit.." in the
"Bookmarks" menu. This window can remain open while you read, so that you can
quickly look through your bookmarks.

Notes

NewView will remember all the windows that are open, if there is more than one
(most help files don't do this, but some do).

Bookmarks are saved in a file with the extension .bmk, in the same directory as
the help file they are for.


ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ 3.7. Environment Variables ΓòÉΓòÉΓòÉ

Environment Variables

The official View behaviour uses the BOOKSHELF environment variable for finding
"online books" (.INF files), and the HELP environment variable for "online
help" (.HLP files).

For those of us who, unlike IBM, don't see much distinction between the two and
get annoyed at the seperation, NewView uses both paths in all cases, and (like
later versions of View) loads either type of file.

So, if you have some help files you want to be able to search (with NewView)
then add the directory they are in to both the SET BOOKSHELF= and SET HELP=
statements in CONFIG.SYS. (You don't need both for NewView, but this will make
sure that original View can find the files).