Symhelp is Symantec's next-generation help system that acts more like a search engine into Symantec content than a traditional help system. It implements features like autosuggest and filtering that users expect from web searches. Content is delivered in XML format and transformed to HTML on demand. Symhelp provides a single source for users to get answers to their questions about multiple Symantec products and versions. Creating a Symhelp deliverable involves cloning a template, adding metadata and section references, and customizing settings before extracting the system files.
2. What is Symhelp?
• Symhelp is Symantec’s next-generation help system.
– Users have less confidence in application help. They often
bypass application help and go directly to Google to ask a
question.
– Symhelp addresses this by:
• Acting more like a search-engine into Symantec content than a traditional
help system.
• Implementing many Web 2.0 features that users expect when retrieving
information from the web; for example, autosuggest and filtering.
• Deploying customized search logic designed to help our customers get more
relevant answers to their questions.
3. SymHelp features
• XML based content, rendered to HTML on demand
– XML topics are shipped to the customer with the SymHelp engine. SymHelp transforms the topics to HTML
on demand and displays them in the SymHelp window.
– XML is fully topic-based, no reliance on ‘before’ or ‘after’ topics
• Meta-data based search and filtering
– ‘Shopping for content’
• Designed for consoles/suites – support multiple dynamic products
– One location to search for your answer
• InQuira integration
– With InQuira, most recently updated version of topics, and new topics, can be pushed to help when
connected
• Goal of SymHelp is to provide a single source that users can access to get their questions
answered.
• In SymHelp, a topic is viewed in isolation from other topics
– Topics are not presented in a nested, hierarchical structure.
– You cannot view a topic in a table of contents, in context with other related topics.
– A topic does not have a previous topic or next topic, and it is not grouped with other topics in a linear
structure.
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4. Creating SymHelp deliverable
• Before you create a SymHelp deliverable
– Verify that your product version ID is available
• Rosetta Online Viewer - http://verisearch.ges.symantec.com/searchserver/rosetta_view/viewer.asp?service=EOS
• Creating a SymHelp deliverable
– Clone the SymHelp template to the Deliverables collection
• From the _Templates collection, copy the following book to the Enterprise Deliverables collection:
– [PRODUCT_NAME_or_ACRONYM]: [Book_name] – SymHelp
– Replace [PRODUCT_NAME_or_ACRONYM] and [Book_name] as appropriate
• Use “ITMS_SymHelp” for product name
– Create book editions that correspond to the product version for which you are creating SymHelp.
– Set up the book.ent element
– Set up profile entity declarations
• If you have profiled content and use entity declarations, you must copy them from one of your existing deliverable into your SymHelp
deliverable. You need one profile entity declaration for each book edition.
– Add metadata
• Product short name - SymHelp uses a short product identifier as a filter when more than one product is included in the same SymHelp
system.
– This is the same prodId used in the Config files
• Product version ID/Rosetta ID - SymHelp uses the product version ID to provide a list of SymWISE topics that are related to the search.
If you are not publishing topics to SymWISE, you do not need the product version ID.
• Link the profile to the keyword set
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5. Creating SymHelp deliverable cont…
– Create sectionrefs to every source section that you want to include in the deliverable, organizing the
sectionrefs by chapter (subject categories)
• You can create the deliverable with nested sections but the transform flattens the deliverable into same-level topics.
• Recommend using a flat structure. It is easier to see if topics are in the correct chapters.
• You should consider using cross-references to create a relationship between sections.
– Delete the chapters (subject categories) that you do not want.
• This step is not optional. You can use the Vasont Details Pane to delete multiple elements.
– Customize the deliverable book client key
• symTOP team has developed a naming convention that you can use
• See “About customizing a deliverable book client key”
• Example: EMM7_1_Help_v61735431, BEWS_User_v1234567, ABU_RelN_v3456789, CCS10-5_WebP_v4567890
– Chapters or Appendices that contain a large number of topics can be unwieldy to navigate
• You can create multiple Chapters or Appendices to distribute topics. You may want to keep the number of sections within a
container to less than150?
– Dedicated Context-Sensitive chapter
• If your Help deliverables have dedicated chapters for CS topics, copy the chapter to the SymHelp deliverable.
• Add role=symhelp to the Chapter
• These topics will not displayed in the search results.
– Extract the SymHelp system
• Help-symHelp->symHelp3.3->.NET.zip-><select profile name>.
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6. Tips
• Review topic titles
– Ensure that the title contains the keyword
• Review the first paragraph of all topics
– Ensure that the keyword is used
• Include cross-references in all relevant topics
– Ensures that users can easily access related concept, task, or
reference topics in SymHelp,
• Run Acceptance reports
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7. Using the same deliverable-
SymHelp/SymWise
• You can use the same deliverable to publish to multiple
outputs, for example, SymHelp and SymWISE
– use profiling to control what content is included in the output
– profile name should correspond to the product version
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