The document discusses different methods for providing application assistance, including context-sensitive help, pop-up help, and tool tips. It describes creating an HTML help system with HTML Help Workshop to provide online help for maintaining customer details in an application. It also discusses using tool tips by adding a ToolTip control and setting the ToolTipText property to display brief help messages for individual controls.

1. Providing Application Assistance
Objectives
In this lesson, you will learn to:
Create context-sensitive help for an application
Create pop-up help
Create tool tips for a control
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2. Providing Application Assistance
Problem Statement 12.D.1
A comprehensive online help system needs to be built for Diaz
Telecommunications for displaying help for maintaining
customer details.
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3. Providing Application Assistance
Task List
Identify a mechanism to provide help.
Draft the design of the help system.
Create the help system.
Access the help system.
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4. Providing Application Assistance
Task 1: Identify the mechanism to provide help.
HTML help displays the help content from an HTML file.
When the user presses the F1 key at run time, the HTML
page containing the help content is displayed.
By using HTML Help files, you can display online
context-sensitive help to a user.
HTML Help Workshop is a tool for creating HTML Help files,
which store the help content in HTML format.
Result:
You will use HTML Help Workshop to build a help system
for maintaining customer details.
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5. Providing Application Assistance
Task 2: Draft the design of the help system.
The HTML help system provides the user with two views:
The Table of contents view where the user can select a
topic and view the content.
The Index view where the user can type the keyword
and the relevant topic will be displayed.
Task 3: Create the help system.
Task 4: Access the help system.
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6. Providing Application Assistance
Problem Statement 12.D.2
While maintaining customer details, the Marketing Manager
will not be provided any manual assistance. However, the
manager may require context sensitive online help while
working with the application.
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7. Providing Application Assistance
Task List
Identify the data that needs to be displayed as help.
Create help for the application.
Link the help with the application.
Execute the application to access help.
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8. Providing Application Assistance
Task 1: Identify the data that needs to be displayed
as help.
Result:
As per the given problem statement, an online help system
needs to be built for:
Adding customer details
Modifying customer details
Deleting customer details
Navigating through customer details
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9. Providing Application Assistance
Task 2: Create help for the application.
Task 3: Link the help with the application.
Task 4: Execute the application to access help.
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10. Providing Application Assistance
Problem Statement 12.D.3
While maintaining customer details, the Marketing Manager
may require help regarding the function of a button. The tip
should be readily available to the Manager.
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11. Providing Application Assistance
Task List
Identify a mechanism to provide help.
Create the help for the application.
Access the help system.
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12. Providing Application Assistance
Task 1: Identify the mechanism to provide help.
Pop-up help
Provides help through the Help button, also called the
What’s This button, present in an application to the right
of the title bar.
Is most effective in modal dialog boxes.
Tool Tip
Is a brief help message for individual controls on a form.
Can be displayed by adding a ToolTip control to the
form and enter the text in the ToolTipText property of
the control for which the tool tip is to be displayed.
The SetToolTip() method of the ToolTip control is
used to set the tool tip text for a control.
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13. Providing Application Assistance
Task 1: Identify the mechanism to provide help.
(Contd.)
Properties of the ToolTip control
Active
AutomaticDelay
AutoPopDelay
InitialDelay
ReshowDelay
Result:
As per the given problem statement, tips for each button
needs to be displayed. Since ToolTip control is generally
used for toolbar icons, you will create pop-up help.
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14. Providing Application Assistance
Just a Minute…
2. Identify the methods for providing dynamic help to a user
while executing an application.
3. Write a code to set the tool tip text for the button control
Button1 and display the tool tip text after 1000 milliseconds
after the user points to the button and display the tool tip
for 2000 milliseconds when the cursor is kept stationary on
the button.
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15. Providing Application Assistance
Task 2: Create help for the application.
Task 3: Access the help system.
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16. Providing Application Assistance
Problem Statement 12.P.1
A customer detail maintenance application containing the
Save, Open, and New toolbar buttons needs to be created
which, when started, displays a message box to the user
asking whether or not tool tips must be available for the
toolbar buttons. If the user confirms, the tool tips should be
displayed.
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17. Providing Application Assistance
Summary
In this lesson, you learned that:
Visual Studio .NET allows the creation of three types of help
systems:
HTML help
Pop-up help
Tool tip
Some of the important properties of the ToolTip control are:
Active
AutomaticDelay
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18. Providing Application Assistance
Summary (Contd.)
AutoPopDelay
InitialDelay
ReshowDelay
The HelpProvider control is used to associate a Help file
with an application.
The Help file to be associated with the HelpProvider control
is specified using the HelpNamespace property of the
HelpProvider control.
The HelpKeyword property under the Misc category of a
control is used to set the keyword for retrieving help from the
Help file specified in the HelpNamespace property.
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19. Providing Application Assistance
Summary (Contd.)
If the HelpNamespace property is not set for the
HelpProvider control, the text to be displayed when the user
presses the F1 key for the control is specified in the
HelpString property. The text specified in the
HelpString property is displayed as a pop-up window.
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