English > Feature Suggestions

In Line Help

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CAD:
Hi Nostra,

Would it be feasible to have an inline help function / help hover function.
Something like a "?" that when selected provides a hover help function for different parts of PVD.
This could / should be populated with info from users (so you dont have to do it)  ;)
Perhaps it could reference a text / xml file for info that could be user populated.

This would go some way to providing a help system.

nostra:
It is a bit simpler for me to provide a standard F1 functionality, so this will be most probably the first help system available. I can also implement a "help hover function" some time later.

rick.ca:
Is this intended to be different than what I suggested here? If so, why would this be preferable?

If the program can be changed to simply handle any call for context-sensitive help, then nostra can just give us a list of valid objects and well can add whatever we like to a help file with the same topic ID. With full-featured and easy-to-use help authoring software available for free, that would be a more versatile approach—and probably easier for users to implement and maintain.

Hover help is nice for new users, but quickly becomes annoying as the need for tool-tip like help diminishes. And then it's not a good option for the longer, more involved help topics and references more likely to be needed on an ongoing basis. For example, a regex reference—even if it would fit in a hover window—is not going to be of much help in troubleshooting a file scanner configuration. The information needs to be available in a separate window—as it would be in a help file. It also can provide me with hyperlinks to other topics in the help file, forum topics, or other web references. Also, using a help file would provide us with a well defined structure for collaborating on developing help topics.

Hopefully, nostra can answer the same question for both of us: Is either one of these options feasible and easy to implement? I'm not a programmer, but my suggestion was born out of the thought that maybe this is as simple as adding one bit of code that handles a F1 press. Help would be called, and it would do the rest. And see he's answered while I type. Doing his seeing-the-future thing again... ;)

CAD:

--- Quote ---Is this intended to be different than what I suggested here? If so, why would this be preferable?
--- End quote ---

Just trying to think outside the box.
If nostra can develop context sensitive help system that we can populate, that would assist in developing a help system.
Dont really care if it is hover help or (context sensitive ??) F1

I have been playing with dumping wiki into pdf or htm format.
It is a bit easier for me to use pmwiki rather than tikiwiki.

see attached (not finished) output. (sorry about the format - this is quick and nasty)
That could be a start of a downloaded help file.


[attachment deleted by admin]

rick.ca:
How are you capturing the wiki topics? I can cut & paste topics from the wiki into a HelpNDoc project topic, but it would be easier to link the topics to HTML files. Do you know if it's possible to download the wiki topics as HTML files?

I'm still curious, but that's probably not a good idea anyway. Help topics can be linked directly to wiki topics. So it would be possible to create a help file that was made up mainly of links to the wiki. That means a help context link might take the user directly a topic that would include one or more wiki topics as child topics. (It doesn't appear possible to link directly because a link topic doesn't have a topic ID.) The same could be done for applicable forum topics.

The wiki topic links are http://www.nimidia.com/pvd_wiki/tiki-index.php?page=...
or for the print format versions http://www.nimidia.com/pvd_wiki/tiki-print.php?page=...


--- Code: ---About
Add-video-files
Adding-a-New-Episode
Adding-a-New-Movie
Advanced-Searches
Application-Title-Bar
Backup-Database
Bookmarks
Change-Episode-Number
Clear-movie-details
Configuring-PVD
Connect-to-server
Creating-a-Log-File
Creating-a-New-Database
Delete-a-Movie
Download-PVD
Duplicate-a-Movie
Edit-a-Movie
Exit
Exporting
Filter-by-Bookmarks
Filter-by-Drives
Filter-by-Loaned
Filter-by-MovieSeries
Filter-by-No+Poster
Filter-by-Owned
Filter-by-Viewed
Filtering-Movies
Getting+Started
HomePage
How-to-Add-a-Movie
How-to-Install-Plugins
Importing-movie-details
Installing-PVD
Introduction
Launching-PVD-for-the-First-Time
Loan-a-Movie
Menu-Bar
Movies-View
New-Movie-Master
Open-a-Database
Open-containing-folder
Optimize-Database
Organize-files-by-episode
Password-Protect
People-View
Permissions
Play-a-Movie
Read-Video-Info
Repairing-a-PVD-database
Reset-Filters
Restoring-a-Database
Saving-a-Database
Screenshot-Maker
Search
Seen
Set-ID
Support
Switch-to-People-View
Toolbar
Undelete-a-Movie
View-Full-Screen
Wish

--- End code ---

Maybe I'll try putting these links in a help project, and seeing if I can arrange them in some sort of logical, hierarchical arrangement suitable for context-sensitive access. :-\

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