Narrow help window

[frma]

I am working as a help author in a project where the help (Webhelp) appears in a customized browser window integrated with the application. The window occupies full screen height and about 30% of the screen width (like the help function in Microsoft Office 2003 products). I keep coming up against design problems: the window width is OK for reading help text, but is really too narrow for illustrations. The application programmers do not want to allocate more space to the help at the expense of application area, and the product developers do not see a wide-screen monitor as a feasible solution.

Does anybody have any bright ideas on how best to deal with this situation? All suggestions welcome!

[RoboColum_n_]

Using such a narrow window for the help has trade offs. One of those is that images don't display well. That's probably why Microsoft don't have many (if any) in their help. You could try scaling the illustrations down although I accept this may not be an option. Could you store the images on a website and link to them?