More Advanced Procedures > Templates and Secondary Windows

Templates in Help & Manual

Templates are like an empty framework for topics, projects, PDF files and printed manuals. They are used to define the layout and appearance of these objects and to include text and other elements that the objects always or usually contain so that you don't have to enter them manually every time.

Help & Manual uses five different kinds of templates:

Project templates:

A project template is an empty .HMX project file that stores all the settings you want to use in a project, including all your Project Properties settings, text styles, HTML templates and so on. Project templates can also include topic content that you want to use in every new project.

Topic content templates:

Topic content templates are entire topics and can include everything that a topic can include. They can be loaded manually, or automatically when you create a new topic.

PDF templates:

These templates define the layout and appearance of your PDF output and print manuals. They are created and edited with the Print Manual Designer, a separate program that can be accessed in the Tools menu.

HTML templates:

These templates define the layout, general appearance and features of your topic pages in Help & Manual's HTML-based output formats (HTML Help, Browser-based Help and eBooks).

eBook templates:

These templates control the layout and appearance of the viewer used to display Help & Manual's proprietary eBook format. They are not editable – you can think of them as "skins" for the eBook viewer.

Secondary windows:

Secondary windows are used to define alternative layouts that can be applied to individual topics and to display topics in external windows in HTML Help and Winhelp Note that Windows Vista does not support Winhelp. If you want to be compatible with Vista you must transition to a different help format. projects.