Download/HomepageMicrosoft's HTML Help Workshop is a one-stop resource, comprised of the
navigation and development components needed by HTML Help authors, programmers, and HTML
expert users who need to know the nuances between HTML Help and standard HTML.
The HTML Help Workshop core component is a Help authoring tool offering a step-by-step
graphical interface, for creating new Help project/content/index files, converting WinHelp
files to HTML Help, and everything else you need for creating an online help system or web
site.
It also includes an ActiveX control for inserting help navigation and secondary window
functions into an HTML file; Java Applet for HTML Help file navigation if you don't choose
ActiveX; an Image Editor that simplifies the import and conversion of images to GIF and
JPEG formats; facilities for converting any existing Help files to HTML Help; and it
offers Compressed HTML to allow reduced file space for your completed files.
A resident HTML Help Authoring Guide takes you through every step, with thorough operating
instructions and explanations, with good cross-referencing to related topics or procedures
-- in itself, a penultimate HTML Help file!
New features in the HTML Help Workshop 1.1 include: associative links (ALinks) and Keyword
links (KLinks), runtime merging of multiple compiled help (CHM) files into one, including
table of contents (HHC) and index (HHK) files. It adds the capability for launching
compiled Help files from a web site, to automatically generate an index that merges a
topic's keyword entries with an index file, and creating training cards via the ActiveX
control. And new files have been added (HHUPD.EXE and HHRUNX.EXE) to allow easier
redistribution of HTML Help systems. (If you're currently using version 1.0, an update
download is available at Microsoft's download site given above.)
And if all this isn't enough, you can look into the "Official HTML Web Authoring
Kit" prepared on behalf of Microsoft by WexTech Systems at http://www.wextech.com/ which goes into every
conceivable detail.
If you're a help author familiar with WinHelp development, this program will ease you
painlessly into honing your skills for HTML Help. Programmers can use it to find out
exactly how to access or embed HTML Help into an application. And HTML users may find it
largely academic, but you'll surely appreciate knowing how HTML Help fits into the
picture. If you're using the HTML Reference Library by Steven Le Hunte, you've already got
HTML Help Workshop installed as a prerequisiite to that program, so at least this write-up
might motivate you to give the HTML Help Workshop a good lookover. It's a clever piece of
work. While free, you'll find updates and useful development information posted regularly
at http://www.microsoft.com/workshop/author/htmlhelp/.
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