Customer Reviews

Official Microsoft HTML Help Authoring Kit

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

The author begins the book by stating "most of it has been written over the last six weeks". Well, Steve, it shows! The book is a glossy overview of the basic features, but is neither thorough nor deep. Pages of HTML code examples do nothing more than state what function is happening here - good luck to a novice that actually has to do something in HTML.

The book is based on HTML Help version 1.1, and I wish I had counted how many times it said such-and-such doesn't work yet, but it will in version 1.2 due out in 1998. Well it's the fall of 1999 now, and I downloaded version 1.22 from the Microslop site only to discover most of the book's examples won't work with it.

I bought this book because I wanted to begin an HTML Help project at my company. After studying the book and examples, I have revised my plans to avoid HTML Help altogether.

Gives basic information on how to create an HTML project, and on the functionality of HTML help. It is sponsored by Microsoft, and it shows. Nowhere does it cover the issues, bugs and shortcomings of HTML-help, or possible workarounds.

However, the book does cover all the basic information you need to develop an HTML-Help project and is a must-have for anyone developing in this media; if only because it is the only book on this topic. For basic info, it is good. For real insider tips, you have to look elsewhere or struggle alone.

This book is written in a point-and-click, monkey-see monkey-do format. If you follow the steps EXACTLY you will end up with (usually) a working help file with no explanation for what you have been doing. The author even tells you that some of his code "won't run in this version but will in the next" - and most don't. Half of the things I want to know (TOCs, FullText indexes, WhatsThisHelp for VB, etc.) do not have adequate (if any) coverage. It is too bad that the minimum rating is 1 star because I don't even want to give it that. If you are looking for a moron's guide to ineffectual help systems - this is the book for you! Everyone else - save your money for a DECENT tech reference that is worth reading...

The book has a very specific topic (HTML Help Authoring), which basically means buy the book if you are creating an HTML help file (or if you want to weigh HTML Help versus Win Help for an application).

The only problems with the book are actually the same problems with Microsoft's HTML Help Workshop Version 1.1 program. (i.e. Doing certain things kills the program without any clear reason why). One would think Microsoft will probably improve these flaws in later versions of the program. Also, it is a lot cheaper to buy this book and work around the flaws than it is to buy a third party product that does the same thing.

Also, the HTML Help Workshop program on the CD is also found on the Visual Studio disk (The HHW.exe program).

I found this book helpful in the sense that it gave me some overall understanding of what can be achieved with HTML Help. As is often the case, this book did not go far enough in providing detailed descriptions of what is possible with the "cutting edge" of HTML Help systems. The long pages of HTML were tedious to read and should have excluded from the printed publication, yet included on the CD-ROM. Regardless, I found the book helpful, well written and worth the purchase price. I know that authoring is not an easy occupation, however I would like to see an advanced book on this same topic from Steve Wexler.

This book is a good source for the HTML Help; it also includes the HTML Help API section. I have no ideas on how to create HTML Help before reading this book. Even before finishing this book, I've already created the useful HTML Help. This book is kind of thin but it has a lot of good information. It seems that more useful information could have been included in this book. I hope that the second edition would come out soon with more useful information included. Overall, it's a good book and the HTML Help beginners should look into this book for the HTML Help information.

This book contains numerous screen shots, but very little useful information. In particular, this book does not provide coverage of application development topics such as how to implement id-mappings for context-sensitive help.

The book is written in the style of "Click here, enter this, select that." It does not explain what you are being told to do. It does not help you understand how to use HTML Help; it just guides you through a number of exercises. If you are familiar with the documentation for Wexler's product Doc-to-Help, then you will find this book typical. Basically, not useful.

This book suffers from shortcomings, but to be fair, so does Microsoft's HTML Help SDK. The SDK suffers from a sloppy user interface, modal windows that should be modeless, some unbelievable bugs, etc., and you can see that it has made the book less useful than it could be.

Specifically, the book is missing information that users of a reasonably well-debugged application should not need, such as a list of bugs, features never implemented, features that don't work correctly, etc.

The other reviews for this book are on the money as to this book's problems. To learn to use HTML Help, I found this book useful, but you must supplement it with information that you can get from web sites that devote themselves to HTML Help issues. These sites point out the bugs and other issues that HTML Help authors absolutely need to know about.

First of all, the book assumes that everyone is already familiar with all computer functions. It is extremely user-unfriendly and most examples are inconsistent with the current version. Worse yet, in the examples, seems like many steps are skipped and you have to sort of grope with it for a while. Are there no other books on this topic?