README.TXT

SearchAll and the Keyword Extractor program are copyright 1994 by Ability
Software.

This file contains additional information about the demonstration version
of SearchAll.

Installing the Demo Version
---------------------------
Create a new directory called SRCHALL and copy SRCHAL.ZIP to it.  Decompress
SRCHAL.ZIP in this directory.

In the Program Manager, add a Search All program group, and add two program
items.  The first item should have the name "Keyword Extractor."  The
command line is KWX.EXE, and the working directory should be C:\SRCHALL.
To view the example help files, create a program item called "Test SearchAll",
with a command line of "winhelp foo.hlp" and a working directory of
C:\SRCHALL.


Restrictions
------------
This is a demonstration version of the SearchAll product.  The Keyword
Extractor program has been limited so that it will only allow two
help files to be included in a keyword index.  That is the only run-time
restriction placed on this version of the product.

This demonstration version is intended to give you, our prospective customer,
an opportunity to try the product to see if it fits your needs.  Do be aware
that this is a demonstration version only.  If you wish to use the product,
you are expected to purchase it.  Purchasing a registered copy of SearchAll
entitles you to technical support, and also allows you to distribute help
applications that use the SearchAll DLL.

For ordering information, contact:

Ability Software
1042 E. Guadalupe Road
Tempe, Arizona  85283
(800)394-8325
(602)433-1271
FAX - (602)829-9290
Compuserve: 72506,3275



Allowing for SearchAll when Creating Help Files
-----------------------------------------------
Under some circumstances, the Keyword Extractor (KWX) will locate 
a keyword, but be unable to map it to a topic.  Considering that 
this product deals with undocumented features of Windows Help and 
the WinHelp file format, this is not to be avoided, although 
we're working at reducing the conflicts that do arise.  The 
following discussion explains how to eliminate--or at least 
minimize--these occurrances.

Normally, keywords, titles, and context strings are defined at 
the beginning of a topic before any topic text is written.  The 
example below illustrates the most common layout of a WinHelp 
topic:

{context string}
{topic title}
{keywords}
{topic text}
{end of topic}

If topics are created in this manner, KWX has no problems in 
extracting keywords and mapping them to topics.  As long as the 
context string, topic title, and keywords are defined before any 
topic text, KWX can extract the keywords.  However, some topics 
include keywords in the middle of a topic, like this:

{context string}
{topic title}
{keywords}
{topic text}
{another context string}
{more keywords}
{more topic text}
{end of topic}

This is done when you want WinHelp's search to position to 
somewhere other than the beginning of the topic.  In this case, 
KWX will extract the keywords, and since it can't find a topic 
title for the context string where the keyword is located, it 
will use the previous topic title.  In this case, not a problem.

The only real problem occurs when you have keywords in a topic 
that does not have a context string.  In this case, KWX may become 
confused and map the keyword to the previous topic.

When authoring help files to be used with SearchAll, your best 
bet is to ensure that every topic that contains keywords also has 
a context string.


Using SearchAll with Third-Party Help Files
-------------------------------------------
Although SearchAll was designed for indexing help files that you 
create, you may use it to create a keyword index for help files 
for which you don't have the RTF source.  You can then create a 
"wrapper" help file that simply executes SearchAll to search 
those other help files.  It's quite possible, though, that in 
creating the index for these help files, KWX will encounter a 
number of situations in which it's unable to map the search 
keyword to the proper topic.


Known Bugs, Oddities, and Restrictions
--------------------------------------
KWX can't process any individual .HLP file that contains more 
than about 16,300 topics. 

SearchAll() can't process any keyword index file that contains 
more than about 32,700 individual keywords.

Since KWX keeps all of its information in memory at runtime, the 
size of help files that it can process is limited by the amount 
of free memory in your system.  It's unlikely, although possible 
that you will encounter an "out of memory" error when extracting 
keywords.  More likely, you'll run into a problem known as 
"thrashing," wherein the program starts running real slow because 
it's spending all of its time swapping things to and from the 
virtual memory on disk.  

If either of these situations occurs, try minimizing and/or 
closing applications to free up system memory.  If the problem 
persists, you'll need to upgrade the memory on your computer, or 
limit yourself to smaller help files.  KWX runs very well with 8 
megabytes of memory.

The Help Compiler that ships with the current beta release of 
Chicago (or Windows 95, or Windows 4.0) creates help files that 
are incompatible with KWX.  Running KWX against one of these 
files will likely cause a General Protection Fault.  This problem 
is being investigated, and will be fixed once the new WinHelp 
file format is stablized.
