C1 Community

Hi - My customer wants a HAT for a web based RIA that will generate HTML that will be, easy to edit for non-techs,  508 compliant, W3C CSS stylable, supports every browser and a few things I don't understand:

"It either has its own CM repository for help files or can share a CVS or Visual Studio repository where the code is stored,
and also the deployment procedure is simple (pulling from the CM repository and promoting into Test and Production environments).

I've been surfing the RH site, specs and examples and from what I've found:

D2H has a home run as a converter of other formats.  However, for Help systems written with it, D2H does not output HTML but rather D2ML.  I saw 508 compliant somewhere in the docs,  D2H uses a proprietary type of stylesheet mark up but it's really flexible, every browser is served. Did I get all that right??

As far as the CM repository - I wouldn't know where to start.  I see that D2H supports collaboration and the writers can use Word or HTML easily.  But I don't think that is good enough to satisfy the CM requirement.  Can I get some assistance with that requirement?

I know this is a tall order with a lot of questions but can some one with experience in this field or with this project provide some quick answers?

TIA your input,

D2 

Hello,

 You are mostly right on target. Let me try to summarize in a few bullets:

• Doc-To-Help does not output as D2HML. It outputs to HTML (and XHTML in the next release). D2HML is what we call the style-based markup Doc-To-Help uses. D2HML is just a set of styles used to markup source doucments. It is the foundation of why we hit a home run with conversions. This may help... http://helpcentral.componentone.com/Article.aspx?ID=1648
• Doc-To-Help has Team Authoring support. It is content managment light. It is basically a check in/check out system to control source documents. Doc-To-Help doesn't have an integration to repsitories like CVS, Source Safe, and Team Foundation Server yet, but you can still store it's files in those applications.
• Doc-To-Help doesn't use a proprietary style sheet. It just uses style sheets in general and ships with default style sheets. And you can edit them as much as you wish. I think you proabably got the proprietary idea from D2HML. D2HML is stored in the stylesheets, but it is just styles and you can change them as you wish.
• Doc-To-Help will produce 508-compliant output.

 I hope that helps!

 Thank you Dan -

That's what I needed to know.

I'm sure I'll have more questions as I look closer at D2H and I'm glad to know this forum is working well.

D2 

What are:

a web based RIA...508 compliant, W3C CSS stylable...the RH site...CM repository for help files or can share a CVS or Visual Studio repository ...and promoting into Test and Production...D2H has a home run as a converter of other formats....TIA?

(from obviously a much newer newbie compared with a "complete newbie")

(Some acronyms are not TMI to a NUBE.)

Thanks,

Tim

Tim -

Wee-e-e-e!  I post I can answer!

RIA stands for Rich Internet Application. 

508 compliant refers to Section 508 of the American's with Disabilities Act. It's based on the W3C guidelines for making Web content accessible to people with disabilities.  http://www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT/.  All web content posted on U.S. Gov't sites (and the web sites of their smarter contractors) must meet or exceed these recommendations. 

CVS stands for Concurrent Version System.  CM stands for Content Management.  Roughly - I think both of these have to do with projects that have many authors working on different but overlapping sections of an application.  CVS and CM are ways to keep all workers on the same version and to keep my code from overwriting yours accidentally.

W3C CSS stylable - what I meant was that I wanted the files created by D2H to be stylable with regular web (CSS) cascading style sheets - not stylesheets like are used in MS Word, or QuarkXpress or some other proprietary format.

TIA (thanks in advance).

 
I hope that helps,

D2 

Hi,

I am using VB 6.0. I have problem when I use the Help file. I have used Doc-to-help for generating help file. I need Microsoft Help 2.0 inorder to function. Could you guys please tell me how to download or get the software?

Thanks

Hi Cooldude,

Unfortunately there is no easy way to get the Help 2.x runtime files.

Currently the only way to get the H2 runtime files onto a PC is to install one of the following Microsoft applications:

• Visual Studio .NET (Express version is free)
• MSDN Library (must be new H2 based one)
• Tech Net (must be new H2 based one)
• Microsoft Office XP Developer
• Microsoft Office 2007

Note that early versions of .NET Framework SDK (1.0, 1.1) also installed the H2 runtime. Installing the .NET 1x framework or VS Express is probably the only free method of installing the runtime.

For more information, see http://www.helpware.net/mshelp2/h20.htm#MS_H2_Runtime