Is there a free software for creating windows help files for your program?

Question

Is there a free software for creating windows help files for your program?

I would like something that allows an output of both CHM and HTML files.

Answer 1

If you're developing for .NET and you're looking to generate XML documentation help files you should look into Microsoft's shared-source Sandcastle project, and the front-end GUI for it "Sandcastle Help File Builder."

It's pretty nice and highly configurable. You can make some really good help documentation using it.

It was a little slow the last time I used it (over 6 months ago) but it may have been optimized since then...

Answer 2

Yes. HelpMaker from www.vizacc.com. Best free help utility ever.

Ron

Answer 3

I'm not sure about 'free', but Dr. Explain is a little over $100 and worth every penny. We use it to product both help for desktop apps sing CHM and web apps using the HTML export. The best part is that it 'auto-magically' mines your webpage or app page and starts the basic construction of the help for you. The ROI for us was about 1 day.

Answer 4

Doxygen, while originally meant to produce code documentation can be made quite easily to produce any kind of help.

Answer 5

HTML Help Workshop by Microsoft.

Answer 6

DocBook is a universal standard file format for writing software documentation.

DocBook is an XML file format and as such is already blessed by Microsoft. It is declarative, earning it further kudos.

DocBook allows you to identify to it what pictures are screenshots, what strings of words are actually commands, and so forth. Which yes, actually means it is a bonafide part of the semantic web.

Because of this, you can use an XPath expression to search for all the screenshots, all the commands, and so forth. Decent IDE's all support XPath searches, and so do lots of small, free utilities.

Once you have worked out which XPath search string returns the content you want, you can write a little XSLT stylesheet yourself or with someone else's help. The stylesheet can collect the information and generate an HTML bullet-list (UL LI), a definitions list (DL DT,DD), or a quick reference card. Whatever you like. XPath, XSLT, and the various *ML languages are very flexible.

Read From DocBook to Integrated Help Systems for information about how to automatically convert a DocBook standard file into a proprietary and very practical Microsoft Windows HTML Help file.

For more information about DocBook itself go visit http://www.docbook.org/ - and grab the free XSLT stylesheets for the latest version while you are there.

DocBook files can be automatically converted into many file formats besides the one used in Microsoft Windows WinHelp files. See the docbook.org web site for details. It is a long list of supported file formats, so brace yourself for a pleasant surprise!

If you already have a structured XML text editor, you might want to use that. If you are writing a really big online help file then consider oXygenXML and/or Open Office Writer. The former is a commercial product and the latter is free, open source software.

For more information about using Open Office Writer to create/edit DocBook files, read Getting Started with DocBook on Open Office.