Post: Need to convert a Word doc u-guide into help using HTML Help Workshop

[Edgar D' Souza]

On 6/1/06, Jennifer Savage <jsavage97 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I'm somewhat new to the tech writing world.  I have several Word user
> guides for our apps that I need to get converted into
> online/context-sensitive help. I need to do this using HTML Help
> Workshop. (Currently we are sending these docs as PDFs to users, so we
> need something MUCH smaller and more user friendly than these PDFs).
>
>   Where would you suggest I start? What is the best way to convert these
> word docs into HTML pages? I know from past experiance that Word throws
> in a lot of extraneous tagging, so what would you suggest? I know I
> will have to break these docs down into small pieces for the online
> help.  Also, is it possible to have screenshots of any kind in the
> online help using this help program from MS? Once I convert these docs
> into HTML pages, how are they uploaded into HTML Workshop and
> eventually converted into CHM files? (The directories are currently set
> up in VS.NET solutions).

Jennifer, here's my 2c - I suggest you
1. Break up the large docs into smaller ones, each of which will
become a single HTML file (a topic).
2. Export each of these to HTML from Word
3. Use HTML Tidy (http://www.w3.org/People/Raggett/tidy/ ) to strip
Word's crud out of the exported HTML files.
4. Build your help project in MS Help Workshop (unless you have access
to other tools like RoboHelp or Madcap Flare). Here are a couple of
tutorials that should help you get started quick:
http://www.io.com/~tcm/etwr2373/planners/ms_helps/Index.html and
http://frogleg.mvps.org/helptechnologies/htmlhelp/hhtutorials.html (by
none other than Char James-Tanny!).
If you need more tutorials, a Google search like this one:
http://www.google.co.in/search?q=HTML+Help+Workshop+tutorial&sourceid=mozilla-search&start=0&start=0&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:unofficial
ought to give you more results than you can shake a stick at (but why
would you want to do that? ;-)
The second tutorial link above also has articles that should help you
on integrating context-sensitive help into VB/VC++ apps. I'm afraid
I'm not quite sure what you mean by  "The directories are currently
set up in VS.NET solutions" - I haven't worked on help for VS.NET,
sorry.

It would be a good idea for you to also join the HATT mailing list
(http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HATT/ ) in advance of your need to ask
further questions; it normally takes half a day or so while a
moderator approves your join request, before you can search archives
for answers to your questions - and failing that, post a new query.
While TECHWR-L members do answer help-related queries, the HATT
mailing list is a specialized list revolving around this area; their
archives might provide you with more specific answers to your queries.

Finally - yes, you can definitely have images (screenshots or
otherwise) in the HTML Help. Both tutorials above should help you on
that.

Hope this helps...
Regards,
Ed.