Application deployment with assistant as help viewer

[wysota]

I say partial mea-culpa because my initial complaint still stands: Qt documentation does not include adequate information about deploying the assistant; it fails to mention the need for the sqldrivers directory with the Qtsqlite4.dll (or whatever it's called), and the need for both the .qhc and the .qch file.

Well... yeah, it also doesn't mention you need a computer for this. I think qch file is embedded into qhc file (I'm not sure though) and it is described in the docs, step by step. I know, I was building a standalone help collection two days ago using that documentation. Is there a chance you just missed the tutorial?

[jml]

Well... yeah, it also doesn't mention you need a computer for this.

Wysota, that's a cheap shot. You make it sound that any idiot should just know that assistant requires the sqldrivers with sqlite3. But I guess it's just a second nature to a brilliant guru like yourself.

I think qch file is embedded into qch file (I'm not sure though)

huh?

and it is described in the docs, step by step. I know, I was building a standalone help collection two days ago using that documentation. Is there a chance you just missed the tutorial?

What tutorial would that be? I have read and re-read the documentation shipped with Qt, via the Qt assistant, in the QtHelp engine section and have not found that information. Please let me know specifically where in the documentation this information is found.

[wysota]

Wysota, that's a cheap shot. You make it sound that any idiot should just know that assistant requires the sqldrivers with sqlite3. But I guess it's just a second nature to a brilliant guru like yourself.

You overestimate me It's all in the docs, really. Just not in a single place but if everything was in every possible place, the docs would take two DVDs and would be horrible to maintain and read.

huh?

I think the help collection file might contain all contents of help database, but as I said, I'm not sure of that. And you don't need both actually, the help collection file is only required for each separate set of help files.

What tutorial would that be?

"Generating Qt Help" in QtHelp module. Just before this tutorial it is said:

Instead, only the compressed help file and optionally the collection file has to be distributed.

Didn't you mean exactly that?

The next paragraph says:

So, in general, there are four files interacting with the help system, two used for generating Qt help and two meant for distribution:

... and then there is the tutorial.

As for the part about help being stored in a database - it is somewhere there although I agree it would be nice if it was pointed out specifically. You might want to post a suggestion to qt-bugs about it.

[jml]

Point taken regarding the paragraph

As already mentioned, the Qt compressed help file contains all data, so there is no need any longer to ship all single html files. Instead, only the compressed help file and optionally the collection file has to be distributed. The collection file is optional since any existing collection file, e.g. from an older release could be used.

It's a bit cryptic and buried, but I should have seen that. Still doesn't address the sqldrivers part.

It's probably pointless to continue a discussion of the quality of the documentation in this case, since neither of us actually wrote it. However I don't think it is too much to ask that regard to assistant as a help viewer, that either the QtHelp engine section, or the Qt deployment section contain some explicit section as to what is required in deploying the assistant help viewer. This would not require 2 DVDs.

Anyway, we've probably said enough on this thread.

[wysota]

This would not require 2 DVDs.

No, it wouldn't. But there are hundreds such places througout the documentation. There are other online resources you may use, remember that. For instance once you get experienced with deploying assistant as a help browser, you might write an article about it in our wiki.