Help Builder supports direct integration with Visual Studio .Net 2003 via an Add-In that can be optionally enabled through the Help Builder Interface. The Add-In makes Help Builder available to you at all times directly from within Visual Studio and provides you automated access to help topics and controls and code in the Visual Studio Environment.

Help Builder must be enabled through the Help Builder User Interface before it works in Visual Studio. Currently only Visual Studio 2003 is supported.

Once enabled the Help Builder Add-In provides the following features:

• Insert Help Topic Ids from Help Builder into Windows Forms and Controls
  This option lets you pull the current Topic ID into any Windows Forms Control that is extended with a .Net HelpProvider by sticking the topic id of the currently selected Help Builder topic into the HelpString field.

• Bring up Help Builder Context Sensitive based on HelpString value
  This option lets you right click on a control that has its HelpString property set and pop up Help Builder on the matching topic if it exists. This makes it easy to automatically navigate to the proper topic once HelpString association has been set up to simplify navigation. This is a design time feature.

• Insert XML Comment from Help Builder Topic
  This option allows you to pop up Help Builder over the current C# or VB.NET Method/Property/Field and insert the currently selected topic's content as an XML comment.

• Insert new topic or Update existing topic in Help Builder from C# or VB.NET Code
  This option allows you right click on a Method/Property/Field and insert or update a matching method in Help Builder. The Add-In parses the member name and signature as well as any XML Comment information and uses that to insert/update a Help Builder topic.
  

Help Builder integrates into Visual Studio via a new menu bar on the Help menu as well as various Right Click Context menus inside of the Windows Forms and C# and VB.NET Source Code editors.

The Help Menu looks like this:

You can always pop up Help Builder using the Show Help Builder option. Note that Help Builder will always pop up with the last used Help File which may not immediately match the application you are working on. All functionality requires that a matching Help Project is open.

Help Builder always pops up as Always on Top so it's available parallel to your code. If you don't need Help Builder visible any longer you can minimize or close Help Builder.

C# Source Code

The source code for the Visual Studio .NET Add-In is available to demonstrate how to automate Help Builder with .NET code.