How to Modify Existing Help Text

Help text is added, changed, or deleted with the Help Text Maintenance option on the Help Facility Menu.  If you wish, you can go immediately to a field description by entering the corresponding field name on the menu or function select screen.  All maintenance is performed on the Help Text Maintenance Detail screen (HP100S02).  These procedures explain how to use the screen.  For more information about each field on the screen, refer to the Screens section.

Each line of help text is stored as a separate record on the Help Text File.  Therefore, each line must be entered and edited separately; words will not wrap automatically to the following line.  Sequence numbers are used to indicate the order that should be used to display the lines. 

Insert a New Help Text Line

1.   Locate the lines that will be immediately before and immediately after the new line.  Make sure that there is a gap in the sequence numbers of these lines so the new line can be inserted.  If necessary, type over the existing sequence numbers or press F18 to renumber all lines.

2.   Move the cursor to the last line on the screen.  This line has all of the fields as the previous lines except for the Sel (Select)  field.

3.   Enter the line of text in the Help Text field.  If the line is to be highlighted when displayed, type a Y in the Highlight (H) field. 

4.   Type a number in the Sqence field to indicate where the new line should be inserted.

5.   Press ENTER.  The new line will be inserted where indicated.

6.   If necessary, modify the Help Tag field for the line.  This field is used to associate help text lines with application screen areas.  It defaults to the value in the Tag field for the last highlighted line. 

7.   If you wish to add a mod-mark indicating when you changed the line, enter a Reference field, or associate the line with a glossary, type a 2 in the Select field (S) and press ENTER.  A window will appear, allowing you to change these fields.

Inserting Multiple Lines into the Text

To insert multiple lines in the middle of the text, you can insert each line individually by repeating the previous  procedure as often as necessary.  Another approach is to move the cursor to the last line of help text for the current screen.  Immediately following this line are multiple blank lines.  Use the F13 key to restrict data entry to the Help Text column, type the text on the blank lines, then use the Sequence fields to indicate where the new lines should be placed.  Note that you may have to renumber the lines immediately before and after the new lines in order to create room for the text.

Delete a Line

1.   Place a 4 in the Sel field for each line to be deleted.

2.   Press ENTER to delete the line.

Change Text Displayed on the Screen

·     Move the cursor over the text to be changed and type the new value directly over the old value. 

·     To insert a word into an existing line, ensure that there are enough blank spaces at the end of the line to fit the new word, move the cursor to the place where the text should be inserted, press the INSERT key, and type the new word.  Press INSERT again to leave insert mode before you move to the next line to be edited.

·     If the change you are making affects more than one line, you will need to retype each affected line.  For example, if you need to insert one word in the first line of a paragraph but there is no room for the characters in that line, you will need to move the last word in the line down to the beginning of the next line; this action might in turn affect the following lines until the end of the paragraph.  Note that one strategy to use in this situation is to insert a blank line at the beginning of the affected area and begin retyping the first line on the blank line.  This approach allows you to see the "old" version while you are typing the new version.  You can then retype the second line over the "old" first line.  After you have updated all of the text, you can delete any unneeded lines.

Copy Text from Another Screen

1.   If you want to copy selected sections of the help text (rather than all help for the screen), access the screen or glossary containing the help to be copied, using the Help Text Maintenance option on the Help Facility Menu.  Note the help tag name associated with the text to be copied.  If no tag is associated  with the text, assign a temporary help tag to the relevant lines.  The first line to be copied must have a Y in the Highlight (H) field.  If this line is not normally highlighted, add the Y temporarily, then return to the screen and delete it after the copy is complete.

2.   Press F19 to save and exit the source screen.

3.   Use the Help Text Maintenance option on the Help Facility Menu to access the screen or glossary where the text will be copied.

4.   Enter the source screen and help tag name in the Copy From fields at the top of the screen.  Note that leaving the help tag field blank copies all help text for the screen.

5.   Press F8.  The indicated text will be copied after the last help text line.

6.   Note the sequence numbers of the lines before and after where the copied text should be inserted.  Renumber these lines if necessary to provide adequate room for the new lines.

7.   Press F6 to move to the end of the help lines, where the copied text was placed.  Type new sequence numbers in the Seq field for these lines to indicate where the text should be moved.

8.   Press ENTER.

9.   If necessary, return to the original screen and change the Help Tag  and Highlight fields back to their original values.

Rearrange Text

Use the Seq field to indicate how text lines should be arranged on the screen. 

Renumber Help Text Lines

There are two ways to renumber help text lines:

·     Type new numbers in the Seq field for the affected lines.

·     Enter an increment in the Renumber By field and press F18.  These steps assign new sequence numbers to all lines for this screen or glossary.  If the Renumber By field is blank, lines are renumbered by 10s (10, 20, 30, ...).  Otherwise, the lines are assigned numbers according to the indicated interval.  For example, to assign numbers 5, 10, 15, ..., you would enter a 5 in the Renumber By field.