Legacy Document

Inside Macintosh: More Macintosh Toolbox /

Chapter 3 - Help Manager / Help Manager Reference

Resources

This section describes the resources that the Help Manager uses to size, position, and draw help balloons for menus, alert and dialog boxes, static windows, non-document Finder icons, and several default help balloons provided by system software.

Help resources generally specify help messages, a balloon definition function, a variation code, and, when necessary, the balloon tip and either a hot rectangle or an alternate rectangle. The Help Manager uses this information as appropriate when drawing help balloons. These help resources are

• the menu help ('hmnu') resource, which provides help balloons for menus and menu items
• the dialog-item help ('hdlg') resource, which provides help balloons for items in dialog boxes and alert boxes
• the rectangle help ('hrct') resource, which associates a help balloon with a hot rectangle in a static window
• the window help ('hwin') resource, which associates an 'hrct' or 'hdlg' resource with a hot rectangle in a window or with an item in a dialog box or alert box
• the Finder icon help ('hfdr') resource, which provides a custom help balloon for your application icon
• the default help override ('hovr') resource, which overrides the help messages of default help balloons provided in system software

This section describes the structures of these resources after they are compiled by the Rez resource compiler, available from APDA. If you are interested in creating the Rez input files for these resources, see "Using the Help Manager" beginning on page 3-15 for detailed information.

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Subtopics

The Menu Help Resource

The Dialog-Item Help Resource

The Rectangle Help Resource

The Window Help Resource

The Finder Icon Help Resource

The Default Help Override Resource