HelpProvider | .NET Windows Forms in a Nutshell

HelpProvider

marshal by reference, disposable

System. Windows .Forms (system. windows .forms.dll)

class

This System.ComponentModel.Component can be dropped onto a Form design surface to provide help support.

Unfortunately, the naming conventions are not remotely consistent between the HelpProvider and the Help classes, despite the fact that they carry out exactly the same task with different levels of automation. HelpProvider offers extender properties for the HelpKeyword (the Topic ID) and HelpNavigator , and handles help requests (through the Control.HelpRequested event) to show the selected page of the HelpNamespace (the curiously named property that allows you to specify the URI of the help file). See Help for more information on these parameters. Help can be individually switched on and off for a particular Control through another extender property: ShowHelp .

Finally, there is a HelpString extender property, which lets you set a string for What's This? help (the little pop-up ToolTip-like help boxes). Again, the class automatically deals with this for you.

Programmatically, you can access all extender properties through the Get and Set member functions of the same name .

 public class  HelpProvider  : System.ComponentModel.Component : System.ComponentModel.IExtenderProvider {  // Public Constructors  public  HelpProvider  ();  // Public Instance Properties  public virtual string  HelpNamespace  {set; get; }  // Public Instance Methods  public virtual bool  CanExtend  (object  target  );  // implements System.ComponentModel.IExtenderProvider  public virtual string  GetHelpKeyword  (Control  ctl  );    public virtual HelpNavigator  GetHelpNavigator  (Control  ctl  );    public virtual string  GetHelpString  (Control  ctl  );    public virtual bool  GetShowHelp  (Control  ctl  );    public virtual void  ResetShowHelp  (Control  ctl  );    public virtual void  SetHelpKeyword  (Control  ctl  , string  keyword  );    public virtual void  SetHelpNavigator  (Control  ctl  , HelpNavigator  navigator  );    public virtual void  SetHelpString  (Control  ctl  , string  helpString  );    public virtual void  SetShowHelp  (Control  ctl  , bool  value  );    public override string  ToString  ();  // overrides System.ComponentModel.Component  }

Hierarchy

System.Object System.MarshalByRefObject System.ComponentModel.Component(System.ComponentModel.IComponen, System.IDisposable) HelpProvider(System.ComponentModel.IExtenderProvider)