Re: Context-sens. Help (without typos this time)

[kanerb -at- concentric -dot- net]

Sorry about the typos; please delete first instance of this message.

-----Original Message-----
Martha,
You are about to have a lot of fun! Help system development is a blast. My
greatest regret about my last couple years as a TW is I haven't had the
opportunity to develop more help systems. Maybe I should have become a
contractor who specializes in it. (Someday.)

These, I think, are the basics. Some people might have more things to add.

1. Buy an online help development app like RoboHELP or ForeHelp (this is a
big subject in and of itself -- which one to buy and why) and learn the
basics like how to create new topics.
2. Start learning the program you're documenting, with the help of the
manual. Keep your thoughts about the program task-based, as in what can this
app help me do -- as opposed to the theory behind things.
3. Create a new topic for each window of the app. You can either do this as
you go along, or do it all up front.
4. As you learn what can be done in each and every window of the app, write
the text for that topic. Lots of it may already be documented in the manual.
From the PDF, you can do a search of the whole manual to find certain text.
From the Frame files, you can copy text and paste it directly into the help
app. Then rewrite to suit your new format of context-sens. help. Write what
you'd want to see if you were a new user, and you came to this window and
pressed F1 to find out what this window lets you do, what each button does,
etc. You need to explain everything in the window and/or create jumps
(links) to other topics that explain the more complicated parts (for the
sake of keeping each topic short, for quick scanning).
5. Whenever you're not sure about styles & formats, it's not a bad idea to
emulate MS Windows 95 or 98 help.
6. Find out which developers know about making the "hooks" between the app
and the help; talk with them and agree on how you're going to execute it.
Read more about linking context-sens. help in your help dev. app docs. Some
might say this step should come before you even start creating the new
topics, but with RoboHELP anyway, I don't think it matters. Check your help
app docs.
7. After context-sens. help is all finished, you can start assembling the
how-to topics, employing and rewriting lots of the text you already wrote
for the context-sens. topics. And you can create the TOC and index, if
that's part of your job. Note: When you have a complete help system (one
that includes how-to topics), it's usually considered unimportant to list
the context-sens. topics in the contents or index.

Let me know if you have more specific questions.

Beth Kane
Senior Communications Specialist
PersonalGenie Inc.
Tucson, Arizona
kanerb -at- concentric -dot- net

-----Original Message-----
For my new contract I've been requested to provide context-sensitive online
help. The manual is a PDF file created from FrameMaker. I've only dabbled in
this, and
then only with MS Word. What's the best way to proceed?