Converting HTML Help to WebHelp

[AngelaPotter]

I am researching what I need to do to convert several large HTML help projects to WebHelp Pro. So far it seems pretty straight forward. My only concern is that these projects use context sensitive help. I'm wondering what kind of impact converting to webhelp pro will have on the hundreds of dialog boxes we have mapped to HTML help topics (we use map numbers that point to the corresponding CHM file). What will development have to do to remap these dialogs to the new location of the help files?

Does anyone have any experience with this type of conversion?

Thank you!
Angela

[RoboColum_n_]

Hi Angela. I'm currently looking into this too. Check out Peter Grainge's site - click here for an article listing four methods of calling webhelp. Webhelp Pro is essestially the same thing so you can follow the same rules. As far as the developers are concerned, they need to change every instance where the help is called (e.g. Help menu item, F1 from a dialog). The syntax of the call is dependent on which method you choose from Peter's article but your developers should be able to work that out for you.

[AngelaPotter]

Hello Column,

Thank you for responding to my post. This is exactly the kind of information I was looking for. Now I can go to our Development Manager with some idea of the impact this change will have on our development team.

Thanks again!!!
Angela

[RoboColum_n_]

Hi Angela. I hope you have an easier time than I did. One of the obstacles I came up against was the question "What's in it for us?". Somehow I felt the answer "Making several hundred code changes." was not what they wanted to hear

[AngelaPotter]

Hi again,

I proposed the idea to upper management first. I have their buy in, so unless Development tells me it's going to take an overwhelming amount of time and resources to implement, I don't think it should be problem. Did your development group give you any kind of estimate as to how long it will take to make the code changes? For example, 1 hour per dialog box.

Angela

[RoboColum_n_]

We have senior management buy in as well but unfortunately it isn't as high a priority as getting the help right first! Only been here three months and seen enough poor help files to last me a lifetime. The developer managing the coding resources estimates a single line of code needs to be changed for each instance where the help is called. Perhaps this be automated (e.g. a find and replace tool) but even if done manually it wouldn't amount to a hill of beans compared to the overall development time of the project. Another consideration is testing. If your QA department is as tough as ours (we are ISO 9001 complient) testing each instance of the help call could add an extra resource to be added to the time frame.

[AngelaPotter]

Help doesn't do a user much good if it isn't accurate. Good luck rewriting the help files. Sounds like you have lot's of job security in your new position.

Thanks again for posting the reference link. I appreciate it!

Good luck to you.
Angela