IFs has used Adobe’s RoboHelp for development of IFs documentation. RoboHelp allows development of documentation via Microsoft Word. As Robohelp is a complex program, this section of the help system is devoted to explaining its use as it elates to the development of the help system of the International Futures program. Some of the material covered here is also covered in the help system of the Robohelp program, which should be referred to increase familiarity with that program. This section will cover the essentials of developing the IFs help system, with some tips that may be of use to developers of this help system.
The IFs help program is grouped into five main books: What is International Futures (IFs)?, IFs Help for Standalone Verion, IFs Help for Web Verion, Understanding the Model: Opening the Black Box, and Appendix: Worldviews. Each of these main books, with the exception of Appendix, is composed of several books, each of which are in turn composed of topics and books. The developer of the IFs help system will probably spend most of his time in the IFs Help for Standalone and Web books, as these are the parts of the IFs program that are developing most rapidly. However, the developer should gain familiarity with the other books as well.
Upon opening the books IFs Help for Standalone or for Web, the developer will notice that the organization of the sub-books largely mirrors the organization of the main features in the IFs Program. Opening any of the sub-books, such as Display, will show help topics for the features found in the Display feature, such as Flex Packaged Display, Packaged Display, and Basic Report. As new features are added to the IFs program, the developer will add the documentation for these new features in the corresponding locations in the help system.
The main books for IFs are actually composed of many different documents that correspond to various sub-books within the main books. For instance, the book IFs Help for Standalone is actually composed of the following documents: IFSHELP, Display IFs Standalone Version, Scenario Analysis IFs Standalone Version, Data Analysis Standalone Version, Extended Features, and Repeated Features IFs Standalone Version. This is important to keep in mind when thinking about the structure of the help system, because the documents that compose the various main books are the actual core of the help system. All of the text for the help topics is contained within these documents. What the developer sees in the TOC is a mere arrangement of the topics found within the documents, an arrangement which is readily modified. The topics within the documents themselves are more difficult to rearrange, as it requires deleting and recreating them in the appropriate documents. The documents are accessible through both the TOC and the Project tabs, both of which are located at the bottom of the Robohelp dialogue box.
In the end, the best way to learn the IFs help system and Robohelp is to experiment, explore, and ask questions to IFs teams members and on forums devoted to Robohelp. The following topics aim to make that process occur more quickly and avoid potential obstacles along the way. The following topics include the basics of opening the IFs help program in Robohelp, creating topics and books, adding images to topics, generating the help system, and various other tricks of the trade.