Version: (using KDE KDE 3.0.5) Installed from: FreeBSD Ports 1. Open KWord (for example, although any other KDE application will do). 2. Select "KWord Handbook" from Help menu. 3. Handbook appears in a KHelpCenter window, but the left-hand pane of the window (the Contents pane) does not show that you're in the handbook, it just has the "Welcome to KDE" entry highlighted. Screenshots: Expected behaviour: http://www.cannam.demon.co.uk/thing/khelpcenter-expected.png Current behaviour: http://www.cannam.demon.co.uk/thing/khelpcenter-actual.png I claim that the "current" behaviour is inferior to the "expected" behaviour because: -- it obscures the fact that the contents pane is a navigable way to reach application manuals in general -- it hides the route from the contents pane's root down to the current application's manual (the "expected" behaviour would have provided enough information for me to be able to find the application manual again later) -- it makes it very easy to click somewhere in the contents pane and then be unable to find your way back again -- it is inconsistent with the behaviour of the tree pane in other applications such as Konqueror, in which the tree updates itself to track your current location. The current behaviour is particularly unwelcome when the application you're using integrates with KDE but is not strictly "part of" the KDE distribution (for example, Rosegarden -- I am a Rosegarden developer). If the application is not a well-known part of KDE, then it is much harder for the user to find its manual again by navigating through the contents pane if necessary, so the clue to the manual's location is essential. Also, of course, the user of such an application might not even be running the KDE desktop, so having "Welcome to KDE" highlighted by default is unhelpful and confusing. (The current behaviour seems so obviously wrong -- I can see no reason why anyone would deliberately make it that way -- that I can only assume it's a bug, but it's been like this for so long that I feel the need to explain my reasoning in this report as if I'm asking for some sort of weird new feature.) It would of course be even better if the contents pane listed the top-level sections within the application's manual as well: Current status of this manual, Introduction, Fundamentals etc. But I guess that really _is_ a feature request.
Oops: Bugzilla appears to have removed my list of reasons why the "current" behaviour is inferior to the "expected" behaviour. They were: 1. it obscures the fact that the contents pane is a navigable way to reach application manuals in general 2. it hides the route from the contents pane's root down to the current application's manual (the "expected" behaviour would have provided enough information for me to be able to find the application manual again later) 3. it makes it very easy to click somewhere in the contents pane and then be unable to find your way back again 4. it is inconsistent with the behaviour of the tree pane in other applications such as Konqueror, in which the tree updates itself to track your current location. I had originally bulleted this list with a double-hyphen at the start of each entry; no idea why Bugzilla would take that as a cue to remove them entirely. Bug in Bugzilla, I guess.
(tap tap tap) Is this thing on?
It's on :) This is certainly desired behaviour, which simply isn't implemented.
Subject: Re: help contents pane not updated to reflect actual location Lauri Watts wrote: > > This is certainly desired behaviour, which simply isn't implemented. How actively is khelpcenter being worked on? I admit I haven't actually seen the KDE 3.1 or newer code so I don't really have a feel for how much work it gets or by whom. I'm just wondering whether it'd be worth my trying to implement this myself. (It would be a pretty inefficient use of my time if someone else who was familiar with the code was already working on this kind of thing. If not, or if nobody else is as bothered by this as I am, then it may be worth it.) Chris
There are some maintainers, but they have other applications that they're working on too, so KHelpCenter is not their main focus. If you're interested in helping out, you would be more than welcome.
I'd like to note that the left content pane is pretty useless in any of both cases anyway since it doesn't allow the user to browse through the content of one program but only between the start pages of different programs. Proposed solution: When KHelpCenter is called by a program instead by the user the left content pane should be hidden/minimized. Also the home button in the toolbar should not refer to the "welcome to KDE" start page but to the specific program's start page.
The contents pane does display the contents of the current document. Please, if you're going to comment on every bug, try the most recent version of it so you know what you're commenting on - there are problems in khelpcenter right now, but 'it doesn't allow you to navigate within a document' is not one of them, in fact that works very nicely.
The "bug" also exists in KDE 3.1.1 with Linux (And therefore I would prefer PDF Handbooks with Bookmarks to read them with acroread...) I also didn't find out how to search in a Handbook. Ctrl-F only will search in a actual page/html file, not the whole handbook...
Thanks for the head up, Lauri. I already used KDE 3.1.1 at that time, but I wasn't aware that help structures of individual programs are shown as well. Neither do they show up automatically nor does a [+] sign in front of them indicate that they're expandable. But that's only for my current KDE 3.1.1, I'm happy to hear if that's different now since it was only you who forced me to look for this feature even though there was no indication of its existence. ;o)
Subject: kdebase/khelpcenter CVS commit by raabe: - Draw a '+' next to manual items to make clear that you can click on them and have a table of contents appear. - When KHelpCenter gets called via an application's Help menu, select the corresponding item in the contents pane. CCMAIL:51680-done@bugs.kde.org M +7 -2 mainwindow.cpp 1.33 M +2 -0 mainwindow.h 1.16 M +14 -4 navigator.cpp 1.61 M +20 -7 navigatorappitem.cpp 1.10 M +2 -0 navigatorappitem.h 1.8