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RE: [platform-help-dev] Remote Help
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<Mark wrote>
Please don't drop the internal OLE embedded help system 'totally' in
favour of an external browser. For me having a help system in the 'same
context' of
the workbench is fantastic, and is fits well with the vision of the
workbench paradigm.
</Mark wrote>
The current approach for exposing the help function in the workbench is
actually a hybrid ... many of the help "control" functions will be
integrated into the workbench (launch, F1, search, "infopop", etc), so the
general way you trigger things will be through the workbench. Certainly
for F1, the workbench "context" is carried over to help. The external
browser will be used for the actual display of the help content and
navigation within the content. We have opted for this approach because
there are problems with the current support even on Win (eg. try hitting
F1 in a workbench wizard that supports contextual help, or try following a
help tutorial that involves steps using wizards/ modal dialogs). [also see
prior post to this mailing list "Notes from 10/30 help review"]
I think you raise a valid observation that on platforms like Win we could
probably do better than just launching an external browser. Perhaps using
the embedded control in a way that can be docked into the workbench, or
torn-off into an external window (without the modality issues) would do
the trick. We should consider something like that as an option for
platforms that have embedded controls, but only after we have the base
function up and running.
