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>WinHelp format, for example, does not lend itself to the way in which we
transition from one topic to another in the linear model.
>though I believe that a format such as WinHelp benefits from the
one-question-one-topic model, the issue of a specific length that is present
in the modular model doesn't rear its ugly head.
>HTML seems to me to be immune from the contrivances that
the modular model and the WinHelp format encourage. We
are free to write about a topic to whatever length the
topic demands, we may transition from one passage to
another within the page, and yet we have the opportunity
to chunk information into discrete topics and to hyperlink
where necessary to provide the reader with multiple paths
through the information.
>But when I say HTML, I mean the "traditional" Web page paradigm rather than
any of the more esoteric HTML implementations such as WebHelp or HTMLHelp.
>Perhaps HTML is the medium to which your combination of linear and modular
approaches is well suited.
Absolutely. Note, however, that there are some help environments that are
based around a long-page, linear-hypertext model, and note that WinHelp and
HTML Help have 90% of the features that are required to suppose anchors/
bookmarks/ subsections/ long structured pages. This lack of deliberate
support for HTML anchors, including index attributes in the <h#> tag, is the
greatest theoretical failure in today's hypertext "help" systems.
A good name for this format, which can be more or less implemented in HTML
or HTML Help or WinHelp, is most immediately recognized by my term "The
White-paper format", where you often assume a long scrolling structured doc
with top-of-page hyperlinked hierarchical TOC. Moving from such a
linear-hypertext system to HTML Help was an incredible step backwards and
motivated the development of my website presenting the linear-hypertext
model. Tool developers and authors have yet to bring the best aspects of
Help viewers together with the best aspects of the Web page model.
Authoring tools also need to better support linear, moderate hypertext.
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