Hyperviews:Online Winter 2001 Book Review column

		BOOK REVIEW: Teach Yourself RoboHelp 2000 for HTML Help in 24 Hours By Char James-Tanny. SAMS Publishing, 2000.
	B Y N A N C Y A L L I S O N Boston Chapter
Getting Up to Speed on RoboHTML	This book will get you up to speed on RoboHelp 2000 for HTML Help (RoboHTML). RoboHTML is the HTML help authoring tool from e-Help Corporation (the former Blue Sky). This book provides a systematic explanation of RoboHTML, along with review questions, test exercises, and sample files on CD. If you work your way diligently through this book, you will learn RoboHTML thoroughly.
Getting a Grip on Advanced Help Tools	For many technical writers who do not have a programming background, it can be a challenge to learn new technical tools, such as Dynamic HTML (DHTML) or JavaScript. Courses intended for programmers are far too detailed for nonprogrammers, and it's rare to find books or courses designed for technical communicators. James-Tanny's book provides a rare opportunity for technical communicators to learn the advanced tools that can be used in online help and web documentation. The chapters on DHTML, JavaScript, ActiveX controls, and HTML Help controls provide a good grounding in these tools.
A Second- Generation Help Book	The first generation of books about online help technology provided extensive tutorials about help system design. Chapters were devoted to topic types, topic design, and system organization. James-Tanny appropriately skips this body of knowledge, which has been amply covered elsewhere, and focuses purely on technical tools and techniques.
Helpful Hints	A master of diplomacy, Char James-Tanny also manages to identify bugs and shortcomings, and suggest workarounds, without sounding negative. For example, on page 241 she says, "If you place the ActiveX <OBJECT> code between the <HEAD> and </HEAD> tags, RoboHTML moves it so that it precedes the topic heading, which affects your formatting. Place the ActiveX code before the </BODY> tag ..."
Unavoidable Difficulties	An unavoidable problem for books like this is that they have no control over readers' system configurations. Compatibility or configuration problems can cause the book's procedures to fail in ways that the author can't possibly control. For example, I could get one script to work successfully in Netscape Navigator, but not in Microsoft Internet Explorer. The problem turned out to be the configuration of IE on my system. The book's example files successfully illustrate the practical application of every RoboHTML feature until the topic of context-sensitive help arises. In practice, context-sensitive help is created when your help is linked to an application. You work with engineers to perform the linking. There's no way to ship an engineer with each copy of this book, so the reader cannot work with an engineer to link sample code with an application. To give the reader a general idea of how context-sensitive help works, the CD-ROM provides a facsimile.
Bookmaking Comments	In general, this book is attractive and readable. However, a few design improvements could make it easier to use. The index is extensive. However, it gives the impression of having been done by someone who did not understand the content. For example, three page numbers are listed for the entry "Options button." However, two citations concern whether to include an Options button in the help system's browser window. The third concerns an entirely different Options button in the Reports database. At times, it was hard to find information when the Index was not adequate and fairly long chapter sections did not have descriptive subheadings. For example, I wanted to learn how to link a book in the Table of Contents to a topic. The Index entry books (Table of Contents) and subentry linking to topics did not take me to the instructions for doing this. I eventually found them by scanning the first three pages of the section titled "Using the TOC Composer." There were no subheadings in those pages to make scanning easier. Finally, on pages 24 and 26, the book provides three densely detailed diagrams identifying the icons used in the icon-heavy RoboHTML user interface (UI). Throughout the remainder of the book, icons are referred to by name only. They are not shown in the text or in the margins, nor is their location in the UI usually noted. This may have been done to save space in the book, which is more than 400 pages long. In any case, the result was that I had a number of perplexed moments trying to recognize and locate icons in the UI.
Time Limit	Be aware that the sample copy of RoboHTML provided on the CD is usable for one month only. Make sure that you will have enough free time within that month to work your way through the book. I did not keep a record of the time I spent working through the text, but 24 hours sounds about right. However, finding those 24 free hours in the course of one 30-day period was difficult!
Buy This Book?	Certainly, if you want to learn RoboHelp 2000, or if you want to jump the hurdles of DHTML, JavaScript, ActiveX, and HTML Help controls.
	Nancy Allison is a freelance technical writer specializing in online help. Her e-mail address is gardener@world.std.com. Copyright © 2001 Nancy Allison submitted to the STC for use in Hyperviews:Online.
Winter 2001 Volume 4, # 1