Re: Online Doc but no paper

[Rose Wilcox <RWILC -at- FAST -dot- DOT -dot- STATE -dot- AZ -dot- US>]

Cathy McNair wrote (in the midst of an erudite discussion of on-line vs.
paper and possible solutions, well worth reading:
>The Windows online help does not support
>printing the entire thing as a book.

While this is mostly true, RoboHelp 3.0 Winhelp Office ships with new
utility.  This utility allows you to put a button in the .hlp file that will
display the topics of the .hlp in a tree structure.  Your user can then
select all or a portion of the topics for printing.  Previously the user
could only print a topic at a time.

But I agree, it is not a replacement for a book and should not be created as
such.

Also Doc-to-Help and RoboHelp both, in their own unique ways :-), allow me
as a writer to export the help file into a document and print as a book.

However, I tend to design help files as help files and books as books.  As a
user advocate, I don't think the dual-purpose document (help as a manual or
a manual as a help system) works very well in most cases.  I would write one
for a client if they insisted that was what they needed, but I wouldn't
recommend that solution.

It's a cost-savings for the organization making the document, but it's not a
better system for the user, particularly in the winhlp environment where you
can deliver decent hypertext help systems that really *help*.... (if you
know how! :-))

Rosie "the Riter" Wilcox
rwilc -at- fast -dot- dot -dot- state -dot- az -dot- us
ncrowe -at- primenet -dot- com
"Life's been nothing but paperwork."
Gustav Mahler