"Standard" UDF Function Comments to .CHM Help File(s)

[MartiniThePilot]

Hi,

while working on an UDF, I think I've read somewhere (in the forum) about "standard UDF coding rules" and how the header comments may be later converted automatically into .chm help files. Apparently I'm unable to (re)find this within the forum(s).

I guess, due to many UDF comments looking the same, the comments should look like this: (example taken from Array.au3)

expandcollapse popup

; #FUNCTION# ========================================================
; Name...........: _ArrayBinarySearch



; Description ...: Uses the binary search algorithm to search through a 1-dimensional array.

; Syntax.........: _ArrayBinarySearch(Const ByRef $avArray, $vValue[, $iStart = 0[, $iEnd = 0]])

; Parameters ....: $avArray - Array to search

; $vValue - Value to find

; $iWidth - [optional] Index of array to start searching at

; $iHeight - [optional] Index of array to stop searching at

; Return values .: Success - Index that value was found at

; Failure - -1, sets @error to:

; |1 - $avArray is not an array

; |2 - $vValue outside of array's min/max values

; |3 - $vValue was not found in array

; |4 - $iStart is greater than $iEnd



; |5 - $avArray is not a 1 dimensional array

; Author ........: Jos van der Zande <jdeb at autoitscript dot com>

; Modified.......: Ultima - added $iEnd as parameter, code cleanup



; Remarks .......: When performing a binary search on an array of items, the contents MUST be sorted before the search is done.

; Otherwise undefined results will be returned.

; Related .......: _ArrayFindAll, _ArraySearch



; Link ..........;

; Example .......; Yes

; ===================================================================

Somehow this is coverted to (see attached picture).

Is there a script and/or tool I could use for myself to create the .chm file from my UDF comments ?

Thanks in advance!

Regards,

Martini

Edited July 7, 2015 by Melba23
Fixed formatting

[GEOSoft]

You could search Example Scripts for Help File Generator (creator?) by PaulIA and you can also look at the code here to see how it's done by the AutoIt team.

http://www.autoitscript.com/autoit3/files/...2.13.13-src.exe

You can also use AutoIt to generate the headers for you. I have a function to generate my headers but that won't be any good to you because I don't use the standard AutoIt header. I prefer the old style. I think I may have made a modified version of that function for someone else so that it did generate the AutoIt style and I definitly have one to convert all the AutoIt headers to the style I use. In other words it's fairly simple to write code to do what you want.

EDIT: Whatever you do, don't use links to MSDN in your headers. The MSDN site changes so often that your links will be valid today and broken tomorrow.

Edited March 13, 2009 by GEOSoft

[MartiniThePilot]

Thanks for your immediate reply George!

You could search Example Scripts for Help File Generator (creator?) by PaulIA...

I still wasn't able to find a (direct) conversion to .chm files. Seems I was too naive... So I understood, the path to be taken is via .html .

Topics I found (so far) are:

• Help File Generator, Quickly Generate Help File Documentation by big_daddy. This script supports the creation of standard text input for the conversion process to .html with the (All)txt2htm.au3 tool.
• Software Request: CHM Help file maker where Jos points to the Microsoft Help Workshop which is used also by the AutoIt development team. So I understand, I need at least this or a similar tool - ok so far - I will download and install it from Microsoft HTML Help 1.4 SDK (Can't resist to give the MSDN link )
• Generate Help Files For Your Programs..., ...in .Au3, .Html, or .Txt format by The_Ape for a more general approach to .txt or .html files with (optional) CSS customizing.

...and you can also look at the code here to see how it's done by the AutoIt team.

http://www.autoitscript.com/autoit3/files/...2.13.13-src.exe

Downloaded the docu source and had a look. The Readme.txt at \docs\autoit\english\txt2htm\ specifies a standard to use on conversion to .html with the All_txt2htm.au3 tool at \docs\autoit\english. So I will use this for conversion of the .txt files to .html and than the MS Help Workshop to create the .chm .

Because there is a standard for the intermediate .txt format and not directly for the .au3 comments, I will use a comment box style I like myself if I had to write some code to generate the .txt files anyway.

Wouldn't that be a nice tool feature for SciTE? Creating a .txt, .html or .chm file directly from your .au3 source?

Thanks again for pushing me into the right direction!

I'll be back! (with results)

Martini