Information Library for Solaris 2.6 (Intel Platform Edition)

Getting Started

The AnswerBook2 product is a replacement for the existing AnswerBook product and is part of the Solaris 2.6 operating system release. To view online documentation, you need an HTML 3.2-compatible browser (such as HotJava(TM), Netscape Navigator(TM), or Lynx(TM)) and access to a document server (a URL that identifies a machine on which the document collections are installed and which runs a web-based server to deliver them to you). For more information, choose from the following:

For detailed information about using the AnswerBook2 product or administering a document server, use the online help once you have a document server to access.

What Do I Need to Install?

Table 9-1 indicates what you need to install to provide specific AnswerBook2 functionality.

Table 9-1 When and What to Install
 If you want to do this.... Then do this...
 View online documentation from your desktop (any platform, any operating system).Start a web browser and point it at the document server's URL (for example, http://my_docs:8888). See "Launching the AnswerBook2 Viewer".
 Automatically launch a web browser with the appropriate server URL from your desktop.If you are running the Solaris 2.6 operating system, then identify a document server and select the AnswerBook2 option from the CDE Help pop-up menu or the OpenWindows Programs menu. See "Launching the AnswerBook2 Viewer".
 Enable your system (machine) to deliver (serve) documentation.Install the document server software from the Solaris Documentation CD. See "Installing Document Server Software".
 Add documentation from the Solaris 2.6 Documentation CD to your document server.The document administrator is the only user authorized to perform this function. For information about installing the document collections, see "Installing Server Software", Step 5.
 Add existing documentation (for example, AnswerBook1 packages) to your document server.The document administrator is the only user authorized to perform this function. See "Installing Server Software", Step 5.

Launching the AnswerBook2 Viewer

If you are running the Solaris 2.6 operating system and you select the AnswerBook2 icon provided on the CDE front panel, select AnswerBook2 from the OpenWindows Programs menu, or enter the answerbook2 command, the system launches a web browser with the URL for the document server. It finds the web browser to launch by searching your path and launching HotJava or the first web browser it finds in your path. For information on how the system determines the URL for the document server, see "Finding a Document Server".

If you are not running the Solaris 2.6 operating system, you can also access the AnswerBook2 product from any HTML 3.2-compliant web browser. Start up your web browser and point it to the appropriate document server URL. For example, if your system administrator installed an AnswerBook2 document server on the system imayoyo, you would access the URL http://imayoyo:8888.

Finding a Document Server

If this is the first time you have started the AnswerBook2 viewer, the software displays a list of the complete library (all collections and their books) installed on the "default" document server. The "default" server is identified using one of the following mechanisms:

  1. If you have defined the environment variable, AB2_DEFAULTSERVER, the AnswerBook2 viewer launches using the URL defined by that variable. For example, you might have the following line in your .cshrc file:

    setenv AB2_DEFAULTSERVER http://imayoyo.eng.sun.com:8888/

  2. If the machine from which you initiated the AnswerBook2 function is a document server, the AnswerBook2 viewer launches using the URL: localhost:8888.

  3. If you are using FNS (Federated Naming Services), the AnswerBook2 viewer launches using the document servers it finds under the FNS thisorgunit/answerbook/servers list. For more information about FNS, see "Registering the Server".

If you have no document servers available, you can also access Sun's master document server at http://docs.sun.com.