NewView
=======

The NewView project is hosted by NetLabs TRAC: 
http://trac.netlabs.org/newview

You can submit bug reports using the 'New Ticket' link on the above site.  
However, before doing so please do a search of existing tickets ('View Tickets')
to see if anyone else has reported your problem.

Copyright (C) 2004-2005 Aaron Lawrence 
and (C) 2006-2019 Ronald Brill
with additional contributions (C) 2019-2023 Alexander Taylor

NewView is a free replacement for the original OS/2 online help system.

Major enhancements are:

- New user interface (split window)
- Select and copy direct from window
- Easy to use global (all files) search
- Remembers size & position
- Most recently used files list
- Smooth scrolling display
- Current topic always highlighted in contents
- Can go forward as well as back in history
- Options for fonts, colors and more
- Annotate help files
- Bookmarks
- Fully resizeable
- Automatic web, ftp and email links (uses default WPS browser)
- Drop files to open
- Open additional files
- Automatic language selection
- Automatic index creation
- Enhanced file dialog with help file titles

For a version history, see the file `changes.txt`


Installation (ZIP package)
--------------------------

If you downloaded the ZIP distribution of NewView, you are recommended to use 
the `install.exe` that comes with it. 

The installer gives you the option to install NewView as a standalone 
application, or replace View only. With standalone installs you still have the 
option to associate NewView with help files; but note that this will NOT result 
in NewView being used for many of the help icons installed by various 
applications, because they are often program objects referring directly to 
`View.exe`.

To upgrade, just install over top of the existing version, but check 
`changes.txt` to see if there are any special notes about the new version.

eComStation v1.1 shipped with a version of NewView (the viewer only, not the 
full replacement). eCS Maintenance Tool does not update it, but the NewView 
install is smart enough to update the eCS copy of newview properly.

A reboot will be needed for full replacement, even on an upgrade.

After full replacement, you still have access to the old View: use 
`IBMVIEW <filename>`.

Information about manual install is given below in the *Technical* section.


Installation (WPI package)
--------------------------

NewView is now also distributed through certain channels as a WPI (WarpIN) 
archive.  Open the WPI file in the Workplace Shell to install or upgrade it.


Uninstallation
--------------

If you installed via WarpIN, use the WarpIN GUI to uninstall the NewView\Core,
NewView\Help, and NewView\ReadMe packages.

If you installed from ZIP, there is no automated uninstaller.  You need to copy
the backup files (.bak if you used the `install.exe`) to the original filenames;
you will need to use unlock/replmod to change `HelpMgr.dll` or boot to a command
prompt.  Specifically you need to restore `x:\os2\dll\helpmgr.dll`, 
`x:\os2\view.exe` and `x:\os2\viewdoc.exe`.


Problems
--------

If you need to report a crash or other problem, then be as specific as possible 
about what files were being used, what you were doing, etc. If one is available, 
PLEASE include the `newview.log`. The log file will be EITHER
 - in the same directory as NewView itself
 - in the folder set by LOGFILES environment variable (typical on eCS or ArcaOS)

It may also be helpful to run NewView with the /profile parameter (undocumented) 
and send the `newview.prf` file this produces. Especially if there is no 
`newview.log` file!

- Problem with system modal and "always on top" applications

  When help is opened from an application which is system modal or which has 
  the "always on top" (WS_TOPMOST) style active, NewView will be 'stuck' behind
  the application window.  Possible solutions to this are being investigated.

- Clipboard text is truncated

  Copying significant amounts of text (generally several lines) to the clipboard
  may cause the copied text to be missing the last few characters/lines of the
  selection.  The cause is still under investigation.

- Abnormally large minimized icon area

  If the WPS is configured to minimize icons to desktop, attempting to move
  NewView while it is minimized will cause the icon to grab a 200x200 pixel
  frame around itself.  This is purely a cosmetic issue.

- Install will not run

  `renmodul.dll` must be accessible. Normally this should work if you are running
  install from the same directory, and `.` is in the libpath.

- F1 crashes the application (full install)

  Although it is still possible to for this to be a problem in NewView (actually
  the replacement `helpmgr.dll`), there was/is a problem with the XWorkPlace
  Widgets library, specifically rbutton.dll or rgauge.dll; disabling the XCenter
  will avoid the problem. I don't know if a fix is available yet.

- Duplicate files warning

  The install warns you if the NewView programs or help files are duplicated on
  your system. If you know that the duplicates are OK (for example, that you have
  arranged the PATH to cater for this) then you can ignore the warning.  The main
  reasons you might see this:

    - You already installed to a different directory.
    - You're doing a standalone install on eCS 1.1.  This problem should not come
      up with a full install; in that case the installer will update the files in
      eCS.

  You can either delete the duplicates, or install over top of them, as you see
  fit.

- ViewHelp hangs around indefinitely.

  If you use the old `viewhelp.exe`, e.g. the TCP/IP help icons, then you might
  notice viewhelp hangs around after you close the help window. This is because
  it uses features of helpmgr that NewView doesn't support. However, it doesn't
  seem to provide any useful features itself, so: 
  Workaround: copy `view.exe` over top of `viewhelp.exe`.

- IBM service program (`service.exe`) does not work

  This is fixed in v2.13.4.

- Changing application font

  If you change the application font, either from Tools - Options - Fonts, or by
  dropping a font onto the main window, then you must restart before all parts
  of the application will use the new font. Note if you drop fonts onto the
  right-hand pane where help topics are displayed, this changes the topic font
  which is separate from the application font. Hold down shift while dropping the
  font, in order to change the fixed-width font.

- Fonts and colors not always consistent

  Some help files specify their own fonts and/or colors, in which case the
  defaults you select are ignored, either partially or completely.

- IBM BookManager Reader does not work

  Yet another reinvention of the wheel from IBM, I can't figure out how it uses
  helpmgr so cannot support it.

- Printer setup dialog looks strange

  The printer dialog has white background and version number shows as ???. I
  have no clue what this is caused by, and yes I have investigated it, so please
  don't tell me about it, unless you have a specific suggestion. It doesn't seem
  to prevent things working properly, so it is extremely low priority.

- Printer setup dialog doesn't work

  Some printer setup dialogs don't work, but I have no idea why not. The OS/2
  printing API is not well designed, so it is very difficult to work with.

- After fully replacing help, the OS/2 Tutorial does not work.

  This is unlikely to be fixed in the near future as it is not part of recent
  OS/2 distributions, and uses numerous obscure features.

- The Master Help Index and Online Info Overview - Glossary icons in the
  Assistance Center do not work.

  These are unlikely to ever be fully fixed, but they no longer crash the desktop.
  Personally, I think global search is much more useful (Tools - Search all Help
  Files).

- EPM help may have problems.

  This is fixed in NewView 2.7 or higher, because `View.exe` is now a stub that
  immediately exits, like the original.  Note: If you do a standalone install of
  NewView, but want to use it for epmhelp, you need to update the EPM .NDX files,
  which contain the name of the help program to run.

- Notes are not completely predictable.

  They will not be in the right position when search highlights are showing or
  help file is updated. They still seem useful, and this is rather difficult to
  fix, so I will probably leave them as is.

- Conflict with Styler/2 (SmartWindows):

  This is fixed in Styler/2 1.6.5.1 or higher. Prior to this:
  If you use the "maximised windows" control, then NewView's topic windows will
  also be maximised, and may be too large to view. Workaround: add `view.exe`
  and/or `newview.exe` to the "exceptions" list in Styler/2 preferences.

- Unable to open files with spaces in the name from desktop:

  Make sure the program object for NewView has EITHER: blank parameters; OR the
  parameters field says "%*" (with quotes) NOT just %* without quotes.

- Can't run old viewer.

  I recommend you use the full install, but if you don't and things get messed
  up, to get old view running:

    1. Get a copy of the original IBM view (hopefully from backup) and copy it to
       `x:\os2\ibmview.exe` (x: = boot drive).
    2. Get a copy of renmodul from Hobbes and put somewhere in your path.
    3. Change directory to `x:\os2`
    4. Type `renmodul /i ibmview.exe helpmgr ibmhmgr` (quotes excluded).

  (From Bertie Kemp)


License
-------

As of V1.27.9, NewView is open source software under the GNU Public License 
(GPL), which means (see GPL.txt for details):

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software
Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later 
version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT 
ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS 
FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with 
this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple 
Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA  02111-1307, USA.

Should you wish to encourage me to continue developing NewView, then you could 
use PayPal (http://www.paypal.com) or similar to send me a donation!


Multi-lingual Support
---------------------

NewView can now load different languages for its user interface, and (from v2.14)
language-specific help files.

NewView looks for a file which is called 'newview_XXX.lng, where XXX is based on 
the LANG environment variable.  For example, on US systems LANG=EN_US so it will 
look for newview_en_us.lng.  If it cannot find that, it tries looking for the 
major part of the LANG variable, for example newview_en.lng. If it cannot find 
that, the default is US English (which is built into the .EXE - you have to 
restart to get it back).

Normally, translations are not for a particular region, so the files that come 
with NewView are just (for example) newview_es.lng, not newview_es_es.lng.

You can override the default language with the /lang:<xx> parameter, where XX is 
the alternative language spec.

- Where Language Files Live

  Language files are searched for in (in order):
    - %OSDIR%\lang  (ArcaOS and eCS 1.1+)
    - %ULSPATH%
    - Application directory

- Creating a new translation

  You can easily create a translation file for NewView.  Use Tools - Debug - 
  Save/Update Language to create a new .lng file.  This .lng file will contain 
  all the text items that the program uses.  Translate the text and save it.

  You can call the .lng file whatever you like, but follow the rules above if 
  you want it to be loaded automatically.

  If you send me your translations, I'll include them with the next release. 
  To save wasting your time, check with me before starting a translation, in 
  case someone has already done one.

  Notes:

  `~` (tilde) in the text indicates that the next letter that should be
  underlined and used as a hot key.  (You may also see `&` (ampersand) which
  does the same thing, but does not work quite as well - please tell me if you
  see one.)

  `\t` in the text indicates a tab character, and is used to separate a menu
  item from its "accelerator" or key combination.  However, you CANNOT change
  the accelerator e.g. F3 for Exit by this means (or any means).  Please leave
  the part after \t as it is.

- Updating an existing translation

  If you already have a file, that needs some updates - perhaps for a new
  version - then just save to the SAME file again.  The new items needing
  translation will be added, and items that are no longer required removed.

  Unneeded items are left at the end of the file for you to check; remove them
  after you've done so, to save space.  Note that sometimes items might be
  renamed, in this case you need to copy the old value to the new name.
  (Sorry!)

  New items needing translation will be marked with ***

  Note: unfortunately any comments etc in the file will be discarded when you
  save.


Multi-lingual Help Files
------------------------

Using similar logic, NewView can load a language-specific version of it's own
help file. It looks for NewView_XX.hlp, where XX is derived from LANG as for 
.lng files above.

For a starting point, you can take the included NewView.ipf. Note that I do NOT
use this as the source; this file is generated by VyperHelp. This file is not 
installed, it's just included in the zip file.


Translation Credits
-------------------

Big thanks to the following people who have submitted and updated translations:

Swedish - Simon Gronlund
German - Christian Hennecke, Chris Hellwig
Russian - Yuri Prokushev
Spanish - David Mediavilla Ezquibela, Alfredo Fernandez Diaz
French - Guillaume Gay
Korean - Tomoarai (Kazuhiko Tani), KO Myung-Hun
Japanese - Tomoarai
Czech - Michal Pohorelsky
Dutch - Jacques van Leeuwen, Kris Steenhaut
Esperanto - Jonathan Moylan
Finnish - Tapani Raikkonen
Italian - Alberto Gabrielli, Gabriele Gamba

I hope I didn't miss anyone, I have got a bit confused about translations sometimes!


Support NewView
---------------

If you find NewView helpful, please let me know: aaronl at consultant dot com.

Other ways to contribute:
- Translate NewView or the help file to your language.
- Blackstar gift certificate (http://www.blackstar.co.uk/circle/gift_voucher)
- Amazon.com gift voucher
- A donation through PayPal http://www.paypal.com

... or anything you like, really.


Acknowledgements
----------------

This has been an ongoing effort over several years.  Many people have helped out.
Some people gave actual money (around US$600 so far) to help me buy that Porsche:

Henk Pol, Moby Disk, Frederick Giroux, Jerauld Prather, Keith Oswald, Daniel 
Caroll, Sten Solberg, Jason Stefanovich, Alexander Newman, Andy Willis, Richard 
Tennis, Gregg Young, John F Moore, Bill Richardson, Jan Magne Landsvik, Daniela 
Engert, Kris Steenhaut, Pieter Kruger Jr, Timur Tabi, Peter Gegenheimer, Gordon 
Snider, Doug Fitzpatrick, Simon Wright, Aidan Grey, Julian Thomas, Philip Mann, 
Robert S Stan, Lionel Abrahams, Howard Harris, Teijo Kaakinen, Lon Hoker, Mark 
Henigan.

Also:

All those people who gave encouragement, testing, and suggestions.

Harald Pollack for DLL rename code.

Alessandro Cantatore for giving lots of specific advice on getting ViewStub 
going, and even writing code to do it for me :)

IBM Engineers:
- Aaron Reed for his help getting the Help Manager working, and especially with
  16/32 bit coding.
- Scott Garfinkle, also for technical help on helpmgr.
- Michael Kaply (Warpzilla). Thanks heaps!
- And all those other engineers who made a pretty fine kernel and desktop

Christian Hennecke for pointing out the problems with multi-lingual, so it is 
now complete.

Andreas Schnellbacher and Henk Kelder for information on associating files.

Michal Necasek, Kendall Bennett and the rest of the Open Watcom team for Watcom 
C/C++. Michal was extremely helpful in answering my dumb questions and did a lot
of work to figure out my 16-bit problems. Great video drivers too. 
http://www.scitechsoft.com. 
Go help Michal out with OpenWatcom on OS/2. http://www.openwatcom.org

Mark Vollmer for pointing out WM_QUERYHELPINFO/WM_SETHELPINFO and thereby getting
SmartSuite working...

Hakan Gadler for persisting with testing.

Nicky Morrow for lots of constructive suggestions about user interface.

Keith Oswald, for the installation suggestions and contributions. (so anyway... 
looks like I did an installer, but it's not WarpIn :).

Everyone in the comp.os.os2.programmer.misc newsgroup for listening to my long 
winded questions!

The eCS Developers Group for lots of interesting discussions.

Serenity Systems International (SSI): Kim Cheung and Bob St John for giving it 
a crack where IBM gave up years ago, and being very tolerant of some wacky 
people. http://www.ecomstation.com

John Bijnens, A favourable review in OS/2 E-zine which encouraged me to 
continue! http://www.os2ezine.com

Cristiano Guadagnino, Author of WarpHelp - hope I haven't annoyed you by doing my
own thing, I wanted to see something happen. Cheers for the inspiration to get 
started!

Peter Fitzsimmons, for the original INF bitmap decompression code (LZW) used in 
Inf2HTML. Thanks Peter! I managed to port it without fully understanding it... 
:-)

Ulrich Moeller, Author of Inf2HTML
  http://www.xworkplace.org/projects.html
And OF COURSE! XWorkplace/eWorkPlace etc etc. What a legend!

Carl Hauser. Original author of INF01.DOC, the description of the INF Binary 
format. Wonder what you're up to these days Carl ;) We finally got there.

Marcus Groeber, Added additional information to INF2A.TXT

Peter Childs, Further updates to INF03.TXT

Speedsoft http://www.speedsoft-online.de
Makers of Sibyl, the awesome Delphi clone for OS/2, Linux and Win32 - Good luck 
guys. Seems they are working on music software now.

Mat Kramer http://www.vyperhelp.com/
Author of VyperHelp - thanks for some suggestions on rich text controls, plus a 
handy help authoring tool.

Erik Hueslmann, Author of Sibyl HelperThread components and maintainer of Sibyl 
mail list archive http://www.sibyl-archive.org/

IBM... Sometimes they rocked.

Joachim Benjamins (Mensys Netherlands) - for the Bugtracker. Good work dude.

"Elwood" Composer of "Unknown Phuture" (unk.xm) - That song rocks...

"Mr Stewe" Composer of "Static Universe" (pb_static.xm) - you should be in 
business man

30 Seconds To Mars - What an incredible debut album, I love it.  Played 
incessantly @ v2.  "You know enough to know the way...". 
A year later: Hrm, now I can't stand it! LOL.


--------------------------------------------------
TECHNICAL INFORMATION
--------------------------------------------------

Manual Installation
-------------------

For standalone use, you can simply unzip the files (mainly `NewView.exe`) into a
directory. This directory can be in the path if you want.

Doing full install manually takes a lot of steps and requires other utilities 
for manipulating EXE/DLL files. All the following procedures are done in the 
installer. I would rather you used the installer and complained if there are 
problems, than try and do things manually.

### A. Replacing View.exe

1. Go to C:\os2
2. Copy the existing View.exe to ibmView.exe
   This makes a backup. Do NOT rename View.exe or OS/2 will
   detect the change and make help files use ibmView.exe!
3. Copy new file ViewStub.exe to c:\os2\View.exe
4. Copy new file NewView.exe to somewhere in the path.
5. Copy new file newview.dll to the same place as Newview.exe, or somewhere in
   libpath

Now all your existing help file icons will load NewView.

Modifying file associations for .inf or .hlp files may not do the full job, 
because many help file icons are actually program objects for `View.exe`.

### B. Replacing HelpMgr.dll

1. Replacing the file
   Replacing HelpMgr.dll is more tricky because it is always in use by the
   WorkPlace Shell (WPS) desktop. You must either:
    - reboot to a command prompt; or
    - use a tool such as unlock or replmod to unlock the DLL
   Back up the old DLL by copying it to a different filename such as
   `helpmgr.bak`.

2. Dependency on old helpmgr.
   You ALSO need to make a copy of the old `helpmgr.dll`, called `ibmhmgr.dll`.
   This also needs to be renamed internally, using e.g. DLLRNAME or RENMODUL
   (now on Hobbes - by me).

### C. Getting Original View to Work

Once helpmgr.dll has been replaced by the new one, the old View will no longer
work because it relies on the old helpmgr.

1. Use a tool such as DLLRNAME or RENMODUL to rename the HELPMGR references in
   your copy of old View to IBMHMGR.
2. Use the tool to rename the HELPMGR references in viewdoc.exe to IBMHMGR.
   You probably want to backup viewdoc.exe before doing this.

    dllrname ibmview.exe helpmgr=ibmhmgr
    dllrname ibmhmgr.dll helpmgr=ibmhmgr

  dllrname doesn't like to do this; I used a binary editor.
  This might be because the file has already been renamed.
  Perhaps renmodul will work better; haven't tried it.

    dllrname viewdoc.exe helpmgr=ibmhmgr

  Note that there is no easy way to get access to the old helpmgr for online
  help. That will require a lot of tedious work by me in the new helpmgr to
  dynamically decide to pass functions on (joy), and actually is impossible in
  many cases because I cannot intercept what I don't know about.


For Developers
--------------

Aaron's original (reference) source is on source to Hobbes.  The latest source
is available via Subversion (SVN) from NewView TRAC:
http://trac.netlabs.org/newview

It is written using two tools:

- The GUI application is done with Speedsoft Sibyl (an Object-Pascal system like
  Delphi) Site was at http://www.speedsoft-online.de but is gone.  It can
  probably still be found second-hand or from various sources...

- The new HelpMgr.dll is written using Open Watcom C++:
  http://openwatcom.org

Download the source to get more design information.


Brief Summary of operation
--------------------------

This can be useful if you want to do manual installs or uninstall.

Files in the ZIP:

- NewView.exe is the main application that views help files.
- ViewStub.exe either activates an existing NewView window, or launches a new 
  copy of NewView if there is no window with all the specified files open.
  (This is done with a list in shared memory).
- HelpMgr.dll is the DLL that apps load to access help. It launches NewView
  when needed.

When standalone, these files are copied as is to the install directory (helpmgr
is obviously not included since there is no use for it).

When replacing:

- ViewStub replaces View.exe
- HelpMgr.dll replaces the HelpMgr.dll
- NewView is installed as NewView.exe
  and serves an equivalent function to the ViewDoc.exe.
  It either goes in x:\os2 (OS/2)
  or x:\ecs\bin (eCS 1.1+)
  Note - in versions before 2.7, NewView.exe replaced View.exe.
- newview.dll has some support functions for newview.exe. (C for speed)
- Old helpmgr.dll is now renamed to ibmhmgr.dll
- New helpmgr.dll now uses ibmhmgr.dll to implement some unknown functions
- Old view.exe is copied to ibmview.exe
  and changed to refer to ibmhmgr.dll
- ViewDoc.exe is backed up and then changed
  to refer to ibmhmgr.dll


-- end --
