Progress
Help Development
Guide


Creating a Contents File

The contents file contains information that populates the Contents tab of the Help Topics dialog box as well as commands that are used by the help engine at run time. Contents files are plain text (ASCII) files that can be created with the Help Workshop (hcw.exe), or in a text editor.

The topic icons on the Contents tab of the Help Topics dialog box (icons resembling pages with question marks) represent links to individual help topics in the compiled help file. This type of link works in much the same way as a jump that you create in a help topic-it references the topic ID (context string) of the linked topic.

While you do not have to create the entire help topic file before creating the contents file, it is helpful to at least create those topics that will be the destinations of jumps from the Contents tab before you create the contents file. That way, the required topic IDs will already exist in the help topic file when you begin work on the contents file.

Strictly speaking, a contents file is not a required element of a help project. But if you create a help file and run it without a contents file, the Help Topics dialog box will display without a Contents tab.

The contents file (*.cnt) is an ASCII text file that contains the information that populates the Contents tab of the Help Topics dialog box. The contents file can also include commands that direct the help engine to do such things as display keywords from multiple help files on the Index tab or use a specified window type as a default.

If you are documenting a modular application with several help systems, you can use the contents file to combine the various help systems, each with its own contents file (.cnt) and compiled help file (.hlp). Modular help uses the contents file to present a unified help system to users with combined Contents and Index tabs and full text searching. Implementing modular help is beyond the scope of this manual; for more information, see the the Help Author’s Guide or one of the many third party help development guides.

The elements of the contents file fall into three categories: commands, headings, and commands. The following sections discuss these elements in more detail.


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