Testing Your Help

Display your help volume and try every hyperlink. Any underlined text (solid or dashed underlines) is a hyperlink. Also, test any graphics that are hyperlinks. Graphic hyperlinks use an open-cornered border (dashed or solid) around the image as a hyperlink cue.

If you are writing application-specific help and you have included any JumpNewView, Man, or AppDefined links, you must test these links from your application. Testing such links using dthelpview does not ensure that the links will operate correctly from within your application.

Run your application and request help just as a user will, trying each of the entry points. This also verifies that the application is using the correct IDs.

If your application is not ready to use (still under development), you can test each ID by running dthelpview for each ID:

dthelpview -helpVolume volume.sdl -locationId id

Where id is the location ID that you want to test. If dthelpview displays the correct topic, then the ID is okay.

Physically run your application on various displays to verify that the graphics are acceptable on color, grayscale, and monochrome displays.

You can also simulate other displays by changing the number of colors used by the desktop. To do so, open Style Manager, choose Number Of Colors, and select a different color option.