nDisplay a new menu when the user opens the Help file.Help displays a menu bar and a button bar in its main window. The menu and button bars are not displayed in secondary windows. You can use the standard menu and button bars as is, or you can define new menus and buttons to add to the standard items. To define the menus, menu items, and buttons, you use Help macros. Your Help file can change the menus, menu items, and buttons at any time during a Help session.
You can reconfigure the menu or button bar at different times. For example, you might:
nDisplay a new menu when the user opens the Help file.
nChange the menus to reflect a certain type of information contained in a group of related topics.
nChange menu items to reflect options chosen by the user.
The menu and button bars are displayed only in the main window, and menu and button macros must be run from the main window. For example, a topic might have a macro that adds a button to the button bar. The button macro works only if the topic is displayed in the main window. It won’t work if the topic is displayed in a secondary window.
Properties of Menu Items and Buttons
Menu items and buttons have similar characteristics. They both run macros when the user clicks them or presses a key combination, or mnemonic. Both buttons and menu items can be disabled (made unavailable) and enabled (made available) during the Help session.
Buttons and menu items share the following properties.
| Property | Description |
| ID | Specifies an internal name for the button or menu item that identifies the button or menu item in Help macros; for example, to disable a button, you specify the button ID with the DisableButton macro. |
| Text | Specifies the text displayed on the button or menu item. |
| Mnemonic | Specifies a keyboard alternative for the button or menu item. The mnemonic is one of the characters in the button or menu text and is identified by an ampersand (&) placed before the mnemonic character.
Menu-item mnemonics are available only when the menu is displayed, but button mnemonics are available whenever the input focus is on the main window. |
| Macro | Specifies the Help macro or macros to run when the user chooses the button or menu item. |
| Position | Specifies the position of the menu item within a menu, or the position of a button within the button bar. Position values are used only when a menu item or button is displayed. All further references to the menu item or button use the ID. |
Suggested Uses for Menu Items and Buttons
Buttons are well-suited for displaying a limited number of frequently used functions. Buttons let the user access a feature using a single key combination or mouse click.
Menus are good for displaying larger collections of functions, especially when those functions can be organized into logical groups. For example, a menu bar might contain 25 menu items, but by dividing those items into six separate menus, the application can avoid overwhelming the user with too much information.
Help can place a check mark next to a menu item, but it cannot place a check mark on a button. This makes menu items more suitable for setting and displaying the status of user options with an “on or off” state.