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Using Help (or How I Spent My Summer Vacation)

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Give a user a Help topic, and you help him for a day. Teach a user to use Help, and you help him for a development cycle. — Anonymous

The first step to solving a problem is admitting that you need help. In the case of Visual Studio, that admission typically leads you to the Help system. Unfortunately, trips to Help are not always positive experiences. The source of user angst is the inability to find useful information in the Help collection that ships with Visual Studio. While it's true that the number of topics is impressive, mining the information can be like searching for a needle in a haystack. Here are a few suggestions that successful Help searchers have used to cast a light on an otherwise dark activity.

Use the Index

Usuability test in recent years have repeatedly shown that index is an effective way to find topics. But to do this successfully you need to understand the rationale behind how topics are indexed. In fact, most users choose index as the primary way to find a topic. For example, if you're trying to find a topic that explains add-ins, type add-ins. You may intuitively type add-in. However, features are generally indexed with the plural form of the noun. It may not be intuitive to the uninitiated, but I'm just the messenger. If more than one topic shares the same keyword, the Results pane below the Help viewer displays a list of topics. You can sort this pane. The Location column indicates the part of the Help collection in which the topic resides. Be sure to notice the Location column. A topic about add-ins in Office may not be the correct match for your topic search.

Use the Sync with Table of Contents Button

This button is on the toolbar at the top of the viewer. Here's a common scenario. You've used index to find a topic. You've found a few, but you're not sure that you've found exactly what you need. You click Sync with the Table of Contents to find the topic in the TOC. Much to your surprise, an adjacent topic is exactly what you need. Adding context through this process can confirm that you're in the right place. It can also tell you when you've obviously used the wrong keyword.

Furthermore, it can help discover related topics of interest. Sync with the Table of Contents takes you to the location in the TOC that includes topics about a specific technology area. For example, you might search the index for information about how to respond to ClickOnce publishing events. After you use Sync with the Table of Contents, you find additional topics that illustrate how to deal with other Visual Studio events, which might also be interesting to you.

Let Qualifiers be Your Guide

Because various products may share the same terminology, qualifiers that follow keywords help you find topics that apply to a specific product or technology. For example, consider the following list of index entries:

add-ins
See also add-ins [Visual Studio Tools for Office]
See also add-ins [Visual Studio]

[Visual Studio Tools for Office] and [Visual Studio] are qualifiers. If you select add-ins [Visual Studio], the index moves to topics that are related to add-ins in Visual Studio. Many index entries include qualifiers. Qualifiers may identify a product, technology, programming language, user interface element, and so on. Use qualifiers to help you identify topics that apply to your specific area of interest.

Use Synonyms or Closely Associate Words

Alleged humans create the index. Someone actually decides which words users are most likely to type when searching for information about a topic. Consequently, there is room for individual interpretation. Furthermore, users have their own ideas about which index keyword would most likely return the intended result. Because of potential disconnections in this process, think creatively when typing keywords in the index. For example, automation and extensibility are sometimes used interchangeably. If one keyword does not return the expected results, try an associated term. The same holds true for:

  • migrating and upgrading
  • source control, source code control, and version control
  • creating and developing
  • add-ins, addins, and addons.

These are just a few examples. Use your imagination to develop alternatives when one try does not return success.

Use Full-Text Search

Full-text search in Visual Studio 2005 can expand your search for help beyond the MSDN collection. For example, you can search a database of partners and newsgroups for additional information. Because it relies on algorithms rather than targeted index keywords, users generally prefer results from the index. Generally speaking, index tends to narrow your alternatives more quickly than search. However, if index is not successful, search is an alternative.

Use Favorites

Visual Studio 2005 has its own Favorites collection. After you find a topic, add it to your Favorites for later reference. The toolbar of the Help viewer includes an Add to Help Favorites button to add topics and a Help Favorites button to view favorites. If you make this process a habit, you'll build a collection of topics that you use frequently. Although you might not use the same topic repeatedly, you can recall the topic and sync with the table of contents to find other topics that relate to the same general area.
If you try some options when exploring the Help system, you'll undoubtedly find a process that works for you. In most cases, the information that you need is available from the collection of topics in MSDN, from a partner, or from a newsgroup.

Jo Molnar, Lead Technical Editor for VSXUE

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