Writing and distributing Apps for OSX compared to those written for the iOS environment is mostly an entirely new adventure. The underlying code is the same, but the concepts of UI design are radically different. Then there is the entire topic of Help Files, or in the case of OSX, the Apple Help Book.
Having several decades of experience as a software designer, developer and distributor, the concept is not new territory. Deploying it in OSX is, however a new skill to be learned. To help those that follow boil all this down I’m going to expose my personal notes on the subject. These notes were derived while using XCode 4.2, in January 2010 [ Detailed Online Information at developer.apple.com ]
Why Apple Help Book?
Flexibility — Writing and deploying an Apple Help Book with the application provides indexed search capability of the Help data, via the OSX Help menu while running the App. Once registered in the Application package itself, it integrates smoothly into the user experience.
What is special about Apple Help Books
They are HTML based. — This makes production of help files for the Application simple. HTML editors are widely available for those that do not have the technical chops to produce the file the good old fashioned way.
Rich Content — Help books can contain video content and even Apple Script to automate help navigation or even perform application manipulation directly from the Help construct. Niiiiiice.
What is a Help Book?
HTML Content — The book consists of a collection of HTML files that constitute the Help documentation for your application.
Indexing Help — Apple provides Help Book Indexing tool located in /Developer/Applications/Utilities, when the Developer package is installed. .
Help API — Contextual help is made available, from the Help Book via a provided Apple Help API. You do not need to utilize this capability for basic help function, but it’s available for advanced Help capabilities.
Exact Match Search for small words — A common problem with basic search functions, is that small or common letter groups may product far to general of a response. Example would be searching for the term ‘CD’. A Help Book with the properly configured “Exact Match Searching“ would be able to return targeted help results for ‘CD’.
Can live In the Cloud — Concept of Apple Help supports the ability to access and deliver content from remote servers (aka the cloud), in three different ways; Internet-only, Internet-primary and Local-primary. It also has the ability to signal need to download and updated Help file for local (end-user) storage.
Links to Online Resources — It’s perfectly acceptable to code the Help Book and it’s title items to be links to locations on the web. An example of this might be a link from the Help system back to the producer’s main website for support or additional help content.
Authoring a Help Book
Full Document Online –[ Click Here ] for the full article on Apple’s Developer Website.