Chapter 3: Finding Information

Apart from this Getting Started book, all the documentation is online only. You get to it from the Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 2000 or Windows NT Start menu or from Mainframe Express's Help menu. This Getting Started book is both online and in printed book form.

Much of the documentation is in the form of online help. The rest is in the form of online books written as Web pages. You get to these from the Start menu or from the Mainframe Express help - when you click a book's button in the help, the book is displayed in your Web browser.

When you're looking for information, we recommend trying the different kinds of documentation in the following order:

  1. See if there's a tool tip.

    If you want information about a field or control, try leaving the mouse pointer on it for a moment. A brief description of its purpose may be displayed, either beside it or at the bottom of the Mainframe Express window.

  2. Try context help.

    If you want information about a menu item or control, click the Context Help button on the toolbar or g at the top right, then click the menu item or control. Alternatively, put your mouse pointer on the menu item or control (don't click if doing so will start a function), and press F1. You may also be able to right-click on the item and click What's This? on a popup menu that appears.

  3. Look in the help, using the help index.

    If Mainframe Express is running, click Help Topics on the Help menu. Otherwise, from the Start menu, click Programs, then Micro Focus Mainframe Express, then Help. Then click the Index tab and enter a relevant word. The index will automatically position at the entry, if one exists. Alternatively, scroll through the index to find what you want.

    In some cases the help index takes you to a help topic that directs you to an online book. If this happens, click Index in the Table of Contents of the online book, click the first letter of the phrase you're looking for, then scroll the index to find the phrase.

  4. Look in the online books, using the Master Index.

    From the Start menu, click Programs, then Micro Focus Mainframe Express, then Bookshelf. Then select Master Index and click Master Index in the left-hand pane. Click the first letter of the word you want at the top of the right-hand pane, then scroll through the index to find the word.

  5. Look in the online books, using the text search.

    From your Start menu, click Programs > Micro Focus Mainframe Express > Bookshelf. Click Master Index, then click Search. Specify the words you want to search for in the Search For field, then click Search. Click the title of the chapter you want to view, then click the browser window displaying the Mainframe Express online books. The browser shows the chapter you clicked earlier, and the text you searched for is highlighted in red.

  6. Look in the help using Find.

    Return to Help Topics, click the Find tab, and enter the word you're looking for. If this is the first time you've used Find since installing, the system will take a little while to create a dictionary.

    There is no equivalent to Find for the online books.

  7. If you still haven't found the information you want, repeat Steps 3 through 5 using some other relevant word.

You will find it useful to select the Contents tab in Help Topics and spend a few minutes looking through the Contents to see what the help covers. Similarly, select each book in turn from the Mainframe Express Online Books folder and look through their contents to see what they cover.

Here are some further tips:


Comments on the books? Click Send Us Comments.


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