Zitat von Michael Schnell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > > > Lazarus context sensitive help shows documentation of the fpdoc files and > > comments from pasdoc (similar to javadoc, DelphiCodeToDoc) and it browses > > through the class hierarchy to show ancestor help. The help content can be > > edited in the IDE context sensitive or via lazde and Kirk is doing a great > job > > here. > > > Sounds good. But nonetheless whenever I talk to a Lazarus newbie he says > is learning curve is bad because of the much little information is and > the bad usability of the help system.
Do you mean the fact that an external browser is started or the fpdoc html pages or the wiki pages? The search functions are bad in all three of them. > I recommend installing the free > Turbo Delphi start it, type a code word in it's Editor Window and press > F1. With this they in fact do learn to use Lazarus, while they would > give up otherwise. Yes, Delphi had always a very good help with lots of examples. Writing a good help is a lot of work. FPC and Lazarus have more than 200.000 identifiers in more than 1000 units. > In the German Lazarus forum there recently has been a discussion on > improving the (German) help. There had been a suggestion to use a Wiki > to update / enhance the help texts. The online help already uses the wiki for the IDE windows and dialogs. You are all welcome to help improve the pages with examples that newbies understand. For me as developer many things are obvious and so I often can't imagine the problems of newbies. That's why we need the help of users - hint, hint. For the source documentation fpdoc is used and the fpdoc editor is one click away. So every user can edit the help ad hoc. The only problem is to create a patch and send it. Maybe someone can write a gui tool for creating patches to make this easier. A wiki for the source documentation is a bad idea, because of the update/rename/delete issues. Some docs needs improvements: - the fpc keywords like 'procedure' (they are described in latex documents) - fpc messages (too short and no links to related information) - translations - the bigger picture (tutorials and books) > But an automated system to update > the online help files would be needed to make this useful. (Moreover the > usability (e.g the "context-sensitivity") of the Lazarus help system > needs a great improvement, but this of course has to be discussed > elsewhere). What 'context-sensitivity' needs improvement? F1 is context sensitive. Mattias _______________________________________________ fpc-devel maillist - [email protected] http://lists.freepascal.org/mailman/listinfo/fpc-devel
