Open topic with navigation

Inserting Keyword Links into Topics

This feature is supported in DotNet Help, HTML Help, WebHelp, WebHelp Plus, WebHelp AIR, and WebHelp Mobile output.

A Help control is a link (usually inserted at the bottom of a topic) that lets users open other topics that have some kind of a connection with the current topic. There are a few types of Help controls that you can use in Flare:

• Keyword link This is a navigation link that lets users open topics related to the current topic based on index keywords that they share.

  example

  Let's say you have inserted an index keyword called "Accounting department" to some of the topics in your project, including the current topic that you are working on. At the bottom of this topic, you insert a keyword link that includes the "Accounting department" index keyword. In the final output, when users click this Help control, they can select and open any topics that also contain the "Accounting department" keyword.

• Related topics link More…This is a navigation link that lets users open topics that you've determined are related to the current topic. This is similar to a concept link. You should use a related topics link if you are applying it to a topic that you want to associate with specific topics but you do not plan to reuse the same link in other topics. Let's say you have an introduction topic for your Help system. You want to create a Help control navigation link at the bottom of that topic that links users to three other topics that you feel are particularly useful to new users. However, you do not intend to use this same navigation link in other topics. So you decide to create a related topics link because it is quicker than creating a concept link.

• Concept link More…This is a navigation link that lets users open topics that you've determined are related to the current topic. It is similar to the related topics link. However, whereas you associate a related topics link with specific individual topics (usually for a one-time use), you associate a concept link with a group of topics (to be reused in different topics). One great benefit of this type of link is that, if you later want to add or delete topics from the group, you only need to do so in one place and the changes are applied to every topic containing that concept link. Let's say you are developing a Help system for an employee time-reporting software application. You might have a group of related topics (e.g., Creating a Time Sheet, Changing a Time Sheet, Deleting a Time Sheet), and you want each of those topics to have the same Help control button that links to the same topics. So you might create a concept called "TimeSheets." You would then insert the keyword into each of those topics. After that, you insert a concept link into each of those topics, selecting the "Timesheets" keyword for that link.

Note: Another type of automated link that can be added to topics is a relationship link, which has a similar result but works a bit differently than Help controls. One benefit of a relationship link is that you can create all of your link information in one place, in a single relationship table. Another benefit is that you can have multiple types of links at the bottom of topics (e.g., one for "Related Information," one for "Related Tasks," and one for "Reference Materials"). See About Relationship Tables.

How to insert a keyword link into a topic

1. Insert index keywords into the appropriate topics.
2. Open the topic.

3. In the XML Editor, click in the topic where you want to insert the link (usually at the bottom of the topic).

4. Select Insert>Help Control>Keyword Link Control.

   The Insert Keyword Link Control dialog opens. The index keywords that you have inserted into topics are listed on the right side of the dialog.

5. Do one of the following:

   • In the All Keywords section, double-click an index keyword that you want to add to the keyword link.

     OR

   • In the All Keywords section, click on an index keyword that you want to add to the keyword link. Then click .

     The index keyword is added to the "All Keywords" section on the left side of the dialog. Do this for each index keyword that you want to add to the link.

6. Click OK.

   The keyword link is added to the topic. Example

   

7. Press CTRL+S or click to save your work.

WHAT'S NEXT?

If you want to change the way the link looks, you can modify the style of the keyword link. See Editing Keyword Links.

You also may want to apply an "online only" condition tag to the paragraph tag holding the link. The main reason for this has to do with creating print-based output. When you generate print-based output, Flare automatically removes any Help control links in your topics, since they do not make sense in print output. However, this may leave an empty <p> tag at the end of that topic. This means that there will be an extra empty paragraph, where you might not expect there to be one. For example, in print-based output, you might notice that a particular topic ends near the bottom of the page. Let's say that on the next page, a new heading should start. Furthermore, let's say that the heading style specifies a page break before it. If you have an empty paragraph after the text on the first page, you might end up with a blank second page before the new heading starts on the third page. Applying a condition tag to the paragraph holding the Help control link will ensure that an empty paragraph does not occur in that location. See Applying Condition Tags to Content.

See Also

Open topic with navigation