CSH topics: can I get them to open in frameless windows?

[gjthorn]

Hi, I have created a WebHelp project with context sensitive help topics for each control in a window the web application GUI. The goal is for the developer to hook each of these topics into a hover help item for its respective GUI control.

I have a Flare topic that lists these GUI controls in one window, and I also created an individual Flare topic for each of these GUI controls. I used snippets to single-source the content in these topics.

I created my header and alias files and assigned a map ID to each of these individual Flare topics to be pulled into hover help. However, once the project is built, these individual CSH topics call correctly but the window they appear in has the WebHelp frameset, and the developer says we need to get rid of the frameset for these topics if they are to be hooked into hover help.

Any advice on how to make these CSH topics open without the frameset would be much appreciated.

Thanks,
Gary Thorn
Technical writer, 42 Lines Inc.

[lacastle]

if you use the full path to the topic instead of just the map ID, it will open without the frame. for example,
http://webhelp.madcapsoftware.com/flare ... e_Help.htm

[LTinker68]

And if you go with that method, there is an option to include a link at the top or bottom of the window that will open the full frameset if the user wants to see the full help.

[NorthEast]

That's fine if you don't mind using direct links to the topic files; but gjthorn mentioned they'd set up an alias file and was making CSH using map IDS (identifiers). So if you want to make CSH calls using identifiers, then you can't use direct links to topics, and so will have to contend with having the skin navigation controls that your output uses.

For standard WebHelp outputs, you can't get rid of the frameset altogether, but there are a few things you can do to hide it; the skin has an option to hide the navigation pane, and the toolbar height can be set to 0.

However, since you mentioned you want to produce 'hover help', I'm thinking the WebHelp Mobile target might be better option, since this doesn't use a frameset at all.
I would try creating a WebHelp Mobile skin with the following options:
1. On the General tab, switch off all the Features (TOC, Search, etc.).
2. On the Styles tab, set the Header style properties for Position - Height to 0px.

Then if you build a WebHelp Mobile target using this skin, you should be able to make CSH calls to your help and the topics will not have any visible navigation controls.