Progress
Help Development
Guide


Overview of Online Help Systems

While help strings and ToolTips provide a first line of information for end users, the information they provide is limited. A help system can provide much larger chunks of information to the end user with a much more sophisticated delivery mechanism.

In a help system, help information is stored in a help file that is external to the application’s source code. A help author creates the help file, which is divided into chunks of information called help topics. An application programmer uses the SYSTEM-HELP statement to direct Windows to either display a specific help topic in a help viewer window, or allow the end user to navigate through the help topics in a help file by displaying a Help Topics dialog box.

While a help system should appear to end users as a seamless part of a Progress application, the 4GL’s SYSTEM-HELP statement actually calls a separate Windows application, winhlp32.exe.

Because the help information is stored in an external help file or files, a help system requires a coordinated effort of information design and application programming. The help author codes, compiles, and tests the help file(s), and the application programmer adds the appropriate Progress 4GL code to the application to invoke the help viewer and display the appropriate help topic when the end user requests help.

A help system consists of three elements:

From the end user’s perspective, there are two general ways to access information in a help system:


Copyright © 2004 Progress Software Corporation
www.progress.com
Voice: (781) 280-4000
Fax: (781) 280-4095