Re: gtk_show_help and gtk_show_url

[Shaun McCance <shaunm gnome org>]

On Sun, 2007-10-07 at 17:10 -0400, Havoc Pennington wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> Sketching out an API here, prototype attached.
> 
> See also 
> http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gtk-devel-list/2007-September/msg00139.html
> 
> Some questions:
>   - in current GNOME, what are the right "parameters" to open a help 
> file? (i.e. what values does gtk_help_show() need to open a gnome help 
> file, such as document ID or anchor or whatever)

http://library.gnome.org/devel/libgnome/stable/libgnome-gnome-help.html#gnome-help-display

The most common way to open a help file is to pass a document ID and an
anchor ID.  DocBook documents are automatically paginated, and Yelp
turns
the anchor ID into a [page ID, anchor ID] pair.  It loads the page and
jumps to the anchor.

The _with_doc_id variant is rarely used at this time.  It effectively
allows you to specify which file to load in a document's directory.
Since DocBook documents are a single file, and we don't put multiple
documents in one directory, it's not useful.

However, a three-identifier variant is useful for document types that
are already split into pages.  This includes collections of HTML files
and (real soon now) Mallard documents.  So basically, if GTK+ can pass
Yelp (through whatever means) a triplet of identifiers, we can make
magic happen.

Some questions:
- What sort of information does the Windows help system need?
- What sort of information does the Mac help system need?
- What about other GTK+-using desktops, like XFCE and Rox?

--
Shaun