Popup Help windows

[WCStarks]

I would like to add help texts associated with the various forms in my application. I am not sure the best way to go about it.



I imagine to:

1) Create a new help table with a long text field, and a necessary context id field.
2) Create a popup form to display the text field from the appropriate help table record.
3) Add a command button on each form needing a popup help screen, which would call the appropriate help table record for display.

Before I proceed, I thought I would ask if there may be any better methods for doing this? Or, perhaps someone knows of a similar help implementation already available?

[ranman256]

I build web docs in Word,where different screens open different bookmarks in the page:

Public kHelpDoc="\\server\helpdocs\helpDoc.htm"
openfile kHelpDoc & "#AddClients"

[WCStarks]

I am not familiar with web docs in Word. Would the htm be located in the same location as the db, or in a sub-folder? Can you further clarify how this would be done in Access? Would I create a second form to display the htm in? Does a statement like this go into a UDF? Public kHelpDoc="\\server\helpdocs\helpDoc.htm"? I guess that the "#AddClients" refers to a bookmark?

[WCStarks]

Public kHelpDoc="\\server\helpdocs\helpDoc.htm"
openfile kHelpDoc & "#AddClients" [Quote]

I have tried for some time to implement your suggestion, but I am unable to do so. Would you please show how it would be implemented?
I have also noticed that these is supposed to be a way of providing context sensitive help using the standard Help F1 key, using the form Help File and Help Context ID properties. But I have been unable to implement this either. This would be a nice method.

[Missinglinq]

• Are you looking to display a single 'help' screen for the Form as a whole...or help for individual Controls?
• Do you want the 'help' to remain displayed, while the users are entering data?
• How much 'help,' volume-wise (i.e. how many characters/lines) are you talking about?

Linq ;0)>

[WCStarks]

I thought I would have a help screen pop up for the various forms upon request and remain open until they close it. The help for some forms may include 1-2 pages in Word. Each form description would talk about all the fields. I had not considered doing help at the field level, though that might be an option. I had thought it would be nice to be able to use the F1 help key, but I have not been able to make that work. I suppose the F1 key could be made sensitive down to the field level.

I already had hyperlinks in some of my forms, so I thought I would try using Hyperlinks. Yesterday and today, I worked on it.
1) I created and populated a help document in Word for each target form.
2) Then I created Bookmarks for each form description in the document.
3) Then in each form that needs a Help reference, I added a "Help" hyperlink button with the path to the docx in the Hyperlink Address property.
4) And added the reference to the related Bookmark in the Hyperlink SubAddress property.

I have been playing with it, and it seems to be working OK. I suspect this solution is much more involved than using the F1 Help key which is sensitive to the active form and perhaps the active field, as this solution requires adding a help button on each form. While I have this solution, I would be interested in learning how to get the F1 key to do the task.

For some reason, I am not getting email notifications for this posting. As a result, I did not see your post until tonight.

[isladogs]

Unfortunately, users rarely read help files - especially if they are 1-2 pages of a Word document.

A simpler and quicker solution might be to use a mouse move event to display a short caption explaining the purpose of individual controls.
Tooltips can also be used for this but they do have issues with reliability.

[WCStarks]

"Unfortunately, users rarely read help files - especially if they are 1-2 pages of a Word document." [Quote]

This is a small Amateur Radio volunteer organization supporting emergency communications for the local Sheriff's Office. The database is used principally by the organization's Comptroller/Quartermaster (currently myself). Certain other officers use it to a lesser degree. So the number of users working with this database is rather small. I could have just had a separate document for them to reference manually. I am getting ready to pass my duties on to another team member when I retire from the team.

[isladogs]

Fair enough. Very commendable. Not everyone is as diligent.