Reference > Ribbon Tabs and Dialogs

The Help & Manual workspace has four main components: The Application Menu at the top of the screen, the Ribbon Toolbar where you access all program functions, the Project Explorer for navigating and managing your projects and the Editor where you edit the content of your projects.

The Application Menu and Quick Access Toolbar

The Application Button in the top left corner of the Help & Manual window is one of the most important controls. It provides access to the functions normally accessed in the File menu in menu-based programs. This is where you open existing projects, create new projects, publish and print your projects, save your projects under other names and so on.

The Quick Access Toolbar next to the Application Button is a place for your most frequently-used tools. It is fully configurable – just click on the drop-down icon to the right of it to add or remove functions.

By default the QAT includes the New, Open and Save tools and also the Back and Forward tools that navigate through the topic files and other Project Explorer items you have visited in your current editing session.

The Ribbon Toolbar

The Ribbon Toolbar is the control center where you access virtually all of Help & Manual's functions. If you use Microsoft Office 2007 you will already be familiar with the Ribbon interface. It is context-sensitive, automatically displaying functions relevant to what you are currently doing.

Tip: The Ribbon can also be operated almost entirely via the keyboard. To display the accelerator keys just press and release the ALT key once – the keys will be displayed in icons superimposed on the Ribbon.

The Project Explorer and Editor

The Project Explorer is like Windows Explorer for Help & Manual projects. When you load or create a project all its contents are displayed here, including both the topic files it contains and all the settings and configuration options. You can load multiple projects in the Project Explorer and copy and paste between them.

The Editor is where you edit your topic content, and project settings dialogs. To edit a topic you just select the topic in the Project Explorer and start editing in the Editor, which works very much like a normal word processor. To edit project settings you just select the settings in the Configuration section of the Project Explorer.