Orange - How to create a index entry without a topic document

It may be desirable for you to create an index entry without a linked topic file. An example might be a general topic which has more specific entries on a sub-level beneath it.

For example, one section of your index looks like this:

You may not want the "fruits" keyword to link to any individual topic e.g. "orange". You know by creating a self-referencing keyword, the user will be prompted with the following message when the topic is clicked: "To locate information about this keyword, please select one of the subentries in the list". This makes sense having topics about e.g. "orange" and "lemon" only and the user dosn't expect to go to a topic "fruits".

To do this for a binary index you need two main steps:

1. Create a index entry without a topic document

  1. In your HTML Help Workshop project, choose the Index tab.
  2. Create a new keyword and set the keyword name to be the header (empty) topic.
  3. Click the Add... button.
  4. In the File or URL and Title fields enter the keyword name again then click OK.
  5. Click the Advanced tab and check the Target is another keyword checkbox.
  6. Click OK when finished.

So the resulting index.hhk entry is like this:

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//IETF//DTD HTML//EN">
<HTML>
<HEAD>
<meta name="GENERATOR" content="Microsoft&reg; HTML Help Workshop 4.1">
<!-- Sitemap 1.0 -->
</HEAD>
<BODY>
<UL>
<LI> <OBJECT type="text/sitemap">
<param name="Name" value="fruits">
<param name="Name" value="fruits">
<param name="See Also" value="fruits">
</OBJECT>
</UL>
</BODY>
</HTML>

 

2. Insert the "lemon" keyword in your HTML code

Microsoft HTMLHelp Workshop can insert keywords as an object tag embed in the HTML source text.

..
<object type="application/x-oleobject"
       classid="clsid:1e2a7bd0-dab9-11d0-b93a-00c04fc99f9e">
       <param name="Keyword" value="fruits,orange">
</object>
..

This keywords are stripped out of the HTML source text by the compiler. One can use this as a trick to the protection of an effortful index since the keywords are only available in the index when decompiled and in the HTML source text no more. You must activate "Include keywords from HTML editor" on tab "Files" in the project properties.

 

On the other hand you may want to find a existing "fruits" topic *without / or with* having sub-level topics (sub-level keywords like above for both cases). This is done by ALinks (Associative Links). You maybe interested in a undocumented function for binary index:
http://www.help-info.de/en/KIT/Creating_Index/create_index.htm#UndocumentedIndex

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