Inside Macintosh: Apple Guide Complete / Part 2 - Building Guide Files

Chapter 8 - Converting Windows Help Files

Preparing Your Windows Help Files

Before you convert your Windows Help files to Guide Script source files, make sure that your Windows Help files meet two conditions:

• Your Windows Help files must be RTF files of type 'TEXT'. Guide Maker (the application you use to convert your files) cannot convert files that aren't WinHelp RTF files.\xA0Check that the file type for all the RTF files you are converting are 'TEXT'; if the type isn't 'TEXT', Guide Maker isn't able to see them. You can set the file type (to 'TEXT') using the ResEdit application or another file editing tool.
• Your Windows Help files cannot contain underlined hidden text. If any underlined hidden text exists, remove the underline before converting the files.

In addition to these two requirements, you should note that the current version of Guide Maker

• removes page breaks from the Windows Help files
• ignores any tables in the Windows Help files
• removes occurrences of the text ">List" in Windows Help files
• assumes that a Windows Help file topic, which is equivalent to a panel sequence in a Guide Script source file, begins with the footnote '#' and ends at the next '#' footnote
• requires the footnotes '#' and '$' for every help topic
• ignores the footnotes '!' and '+'
• uses the footnote 'K' to create index terms
• converts the command bmc (the command to place bitmaps in Windows) to the commented out Guide Script command

  #<PICT> "NameOfPicture", CENTER

  The Guide Script command is commented out because Apple Guide isn't able to display your Windows Help bitmaps. Before you remove the comment sign (the # sign), convert your bitmaps to PICT files.

Note

All footnotes must appear on the same line. All other text and bitmaps on the first line are ignored and removed by Guide Maker.

Once you have prepared your Windows Help files, you are ready to convert them, as described in the next section.