Free help authoring tool software for windows

Helpinators main focus is on making help authoring more productive. Helpinator eliminates double-work that you have to do using regular help authoring tools and simplifies complex tasks. You can compile professionally looking help files in 4 different formats, in multiple languages and for multiple editions of your product - all that from single source!

Major Features:

1. Produces documentation in CHM, PDF, RTF and Website formats.
2. Project file can store as many languages as you wish. You don't need to have separate projects for each language and waste time synchronizing them. Project structure and topic IDs remain the same, you only need to enter content and titles in different languages. Each language can have its own: Contents and titles Templates (both HTML and RTF) Keywords Variables Text Snippets
3. Template engine allows you to customize documentation look and feel. HTML and RTF/PDF templates are fully adjustable. If you don't know HTML or CSS you can use Template Builder that helps you visually design HTML template.
4. Helpinator produces good-looking PDF files with front page, table of contents, header, footer, page numbers and outline. Image Library can save you a lot of time. First of all all images are at one place, so you dont need to browse through your project to find them. Second you can reference one image from several topics. When image changes you only need to update it in the library.
5. Shape editor allows you to annotate images and screenshots. Text snippets save your time just like library images. If same portion of text appears in the same form in different topics create text snippet from it. You will save time as you don,t need to paste it into each topic and you don't need to update every topic if this text changes. Just edit snippet.
6. Conditional compilation allows you to compile different variations from the same source. See website for more detailed view of features.

Enhancements:

• Multilingual projects generate help files in multiple languages from the same source.
• Conditional compilation
• Import and Export RTF and HTML
• Annotate images
• Header, Footer, page numbers and outline for PDF

Requirements:

• Pentium III processor or higher
• 512 Mb of RAM
• 20 Mb on hard drive.

HelpMaker is a software program that allows you to create help files without an expensive word-processor and without having to manage multiple files.
Writing help files is called help authoring. You can make whole help files using HelpMaker. HelpMaker makes WinHelp, RTF and HTML-Help files.
HelpMaker is designed to store information in a free-form way that does not limit your imagination. HelpMaker is designed to make help authoring as simple and easy as possible.
ButtonMaker and ImageMaker are applications distributed with HelpMaker that can be used to make buttons and enhance images used in Helpmaker.
Main features:
Graphical User Interface
- Print Preview Feature.
- Zoom
- View Ruler
Word Processing Features
- Font Formatting
- Paragraph Formatting
- Bullets and Numbering
- Tab Spacing
- Change Case
- Various Styles (Bold, Italic, Underline)
- Alignment Styles (Left, Center, Right)
- Insert Page Break
- Insert Date, Time and Date/Time
- Insert Picture
- Insert Hyperlink
- Insert OLE Object
- Insert Drawing Object
- Spelling (with Auto-spell)
Printing Features
- Print to Printer, Print to PDF.
- Print Preview Feature.
- Print individual document.
Search and Replace Features
- Unicode Search
- Unicode Replace
- Topic Search
- Keyword Search
Import and Export Features
- Import from Word, RTF and Text files.
- Export to PDF, Web-page, RTF and Word Document files.
Table Features
- Table (and nested tables)
System requirements:
- Pentium II, 400Mhz or better
- 32 MB Ram or better
- 50 MB of hard disk space
- Internet Explorer

Enhancements:
- Fixed strange font issue when using Arial.
- Fixed invalid CSHelp.text loading when more than >1024 characters.
- Importing from *.sh5 where the Hyperlink was truncated was fixed.