Viewing/Changing Topic Properties

The properties of specific topics—for example, the topic title and type (conceptual, procedural, etc.), and condition—may be reviewed and edited in the Topic Properties dialog.

Certain topic properties can be edited in the Topics window itself (e.g., type, context ID, keywords, and groups). Simply click in the grid at the appropriate spot to open a drop-down or activate the field. (To see the columns available for display, right click in the window and choose Columns. See Topics Window Pane.)

If you would like to view or change the properties of an entire document, use the Document Properties dialog. See Setting Document Properties.

  1. Open the Topics window, right-click the desired topic, and choose Properties. The Topic Properties dialog opens.

    Note If you would like to edit multiple topics, choose them in the Topics window using SHIFT+Click or CTRL+Click. Right-click and choose Properties.

  2. Make any necessary changes in the dialog.

    • Title The name of the topic, taken directly from the source document. This field is read-only. To change a topic title in a Word source document, use the Rename button on the Doc-To-Help ribbon.
    • Topic type Specifies a named set of display, navigation, and indexing characteristics to be associated with this topic (such as what window the topic appears in, how the topic is accessed, and whether it gets a map number).
    • ASCII Name Specifies the ASCII-only string used to identify the topic in situations where non-ASCII characters are not allowed. This property is important for authoring in languages that have non-ASCII alphabets, such as Cyrillic and Asian languages. In some instances, names generated by Doc-To-Help must be ASCII. Such instances include identifiers in *.h and *.bas map files that are used for context-sensitive Help in C and Visual Basic programming language.
    • URL Specifies the name of the generated HTM file for this topic. You can edit the name manually, or you can set a rule for it in the Project Settings dialog ("URL mode" field). You can also limit the character length of this URL using the "Truncate file name length" field in the Project Settings. Another way to edit the URL is to double-click in the URL cell in the Topics Panel and type it there.
    • Context ID The unique numeric identifier assigned to the topic during compilation (read-only). This allows the topic to be used in context-sensitive Help. Context ID settings are managed in the Project Properties dialog. See Context-Sensitive Help.

    • Context string When using context-sensitive (F1) and dynamic Help with Microsoft Help 2.0, this option specifies the context string for the topic. Each topic can have one or more context strings, or none. The context strings must be separated by a semicolon. Topic context strings form a hierarchical tree structure. A context string consists of dot-separated context names for each hierarchy level. See Context-Sensitive Help.

      Example  

      A topic "Property MyProperty" can have the following:

      • Context string = "MyCompany.MyProduct.MyProperty"

      Topic "Properties MyProperty1 and MyProperty2" can have the following:

      • Context  string = "MyCompany.MyProduct.MyProperty1;MyCompany.MyProduct.MyProperty2"
    • Comments An editable text box for comments by the author. These comments are not accessible by the end user.
    • Default Topic If selected, this will be the topic displayed when online output is opened (the "home page"). The default topic can also be set by selecting a topic in the Topics window, right-clicking, and choosing Default Topic.
    • Contents Title This field lets you change the topic title in the table of contents (Contents pane) without changing the actual topic title in the source document. See Creating a Table of Contents.
    • Display Title This field allows for modification of a topic title with respect to searches without changing the actual topic title in the source document. Use this property to add qualifying text to like-named topics. For example, a search for "intro" may yield several topics named Introduction, but by modifying the Display Title, you can force results such as Introduction (Help Authoring) and Introduction (HTML), without adding the text in parentheses to the source documents. This is the equivalent of adding a<Title> in HTML.
    • Related Links Label Specifies the text that precedes the subtopic buttons for this topic. If you clear this field, there will be no text above the buttons. If you would like to change the label text for a specific target, change it in the Help Targets dialog. The default label is More: See Managing Related Topics.
    • Hide Subtopic Links If selected, the subtopic links will be hidden for this topic.
    • Include in Search If selected, search is enabled for this topic in NetHelp targets. If cleared, this topic is excluded from the search.
    • Disable comments If checked, DISQUS commenting will be disabled for this topic. See Adding DISQUS Commenting to NetHelp Targets.

    These can also be set and will appear in the Condition ribbon group. See Conditions.

    • Platforms Sets a platform-based condition for the selected topic. The topic will be included in all the target platform(s) selected. A platform includes all the targets that produce the output specified; Online Help, HTML Help, NetHelp, Printed Manual, etc.
    • Targets Sets a target-based condition for the selected topic. The topic will be included in all the target(s) selected.
    • Attributes Set an attribute-based condition for the selected topic. The topic will be included or excluded when creating conditional builds (e.g., internal or external.) Use the Attributes dialog (Project > Attributes) to create custom attributes. See Creating and Using Attributes.

    For more about modular output, see Modular Projects and Creating a Hub Project.

    • Target menu Before setting your module link properties, choose the appropriate modular target from the drop-down.
    • Module file For a placeholder topic in a modular hub project, specifies the platform-dependent Help file to be loaded dynamically. (Applies only to HTML Help, NetHelp, and Microsoft Help Viewer 1.x modular hub projects.)
    • Contents file For a placeholder topic in a modular hub project, specifies the platform-dependent contents file to be loaded dynamically. (Applies only to HTML Help modular hub projects.)
    • Use first topic as parent For Microsoft Help Viewer modular hub projects, sets the first topic in the child project as the parent of the other topics in the child project.
    • Inherit Product name For Microsoft Help Viewer modular hub projects, sets the product name for the child projects to the same value as that of the hub project. The product name value is set in the Help Targets dialog of the hub project.
    • Inherit Book name For Microsoft Help Viewer modular hub projects, sets the book name for the child projects to the same value as that of the hub project. The book name value is set in the Help Targets dialog of the hub project.