Creating Help for Your Application

Help created in App Builder displays on a dedicated Help page. To access Help, users click a link that takes them to a dedicated Help page. This Help page displays page and field-level Help topics specific to the page they are viewing.

• Creating Help
  Developers can create both a dedicated Help page and item Help text for an application.
• Using the Bulk Edit Item Help Report
  Edit all Help topics within an application at once using the Bulk Edit Item Help report
• Seeding Item Help Topics
  For applications that do not yet contain Help, you can perform a mass update (or seed) of default Help text.
• Creating a Help Navigation Bar Entry
  Once you have created your Help, the next step is to create a navigation bar entry so users can link to it.

Creating Help

Developers can create both a dedicated Help page and item Help text for an application.

• About Creating Help
  
• Creating a Help Page and Region
  
• Defining Page Help
  
• Defining Item Help
  

About Creating Help

App Builder includes built-in attributes to create Help for your application. Creating Help for your application involves the following steps:

• Step 1: Create a dedicated Help page and Help region. See "Creating a Help Page and Region."

• Step 2: Define page Help text. See "Defining Page Help."

• Step 3: Define item Help text. See "Defining Item Help."

• Step 4: Create a navigation bar icon to link to your Help page. See "Creating a Help Navigation Bar Entry."

Creating a Help Page and Region

To create a Help page and region in Page Designer:

1. Create a blank page for your Help.
2. View the new page in Page Designer:
   1. On the Workspace home page, click the App Builder icon.
   2. Select an application.
   3. Select a page.
   Page Designer appears.
3. In the Gallery, right-click Help Text region, select Add To, and select the appropriate location.

   Tip:

   You can also drag and drop from the Gallery. From the Gallery select the Help Text region and drag it to the appropriate location in the Layout tab.

4. To find a group or attribute:

   • Search for the group or attribute - Enter keywords in the Filter Properties field. The Property Editor displays the group or attributes. To return to the default display, delete the keywords.

   • Use Go to Group - Click Go to Group and select the group. To return the default display, click Go to Group again and select Expand All.

5. Edit the following attributes:

   1. Identification, Title - Enter a title for the region.

   2. Layout, Sequence - Enter the display sequence for this item. The sequence and other layout settings determine where this item is displayed in relation to other items within the region.

   3. Layout, Parent Region - Select the parent region to which this region belongs. If a parent region is selected then this region is rendered completely inside the parent region.

   4. Layout, Position - Specify the Sequence, Parent Region, and Position.

   5. Appearance, Template - Select a region template to define the appearance and layout of this region. Region templates are defined in the application theme. When a region is created, the template is automatically set to the default region template defined in the current theme.

   6. Appearance, Item Display Position - Select where page items display in relation to the main region content.

   Tip:

   To learn more about an attribute, select the attribute in the Property Editor and click the Help tab in the center pane.

6. Click Save.

   Tip:

   For more information on supported chart options, see "ojChart" in JSDoc pages for the Oracle JavaScript Extension Toolkit (JET).

7. Click Save.

See Also:

"Adding a New Page to an Application"

Defining Page Help

To define Page Help text:

1. View the new page in Page Designer:
   1. On the Workspace home page, click the App Builder icon.
   2. Select an application.
   3. Select a page.
   Page Designer appears.
2. In the Rendering tab, click the page name.
3. To find a group or attribute:

   • Search for the group or attribute - Enter keywords in the Filter Properties field. The Property Editor displays the group or attributes. To return to the default display, delete the keywords.

   • Use Go to Group - Click Go to Group and select the group. To return the default display, click Go to Group again and select Expand All.

4. In Property Editor - Page, find Help and enter text in Help Text attribute.
5. Click Save.

Defining Item Help

To define item Help:

1. View the new page in Page Designer:
   1. On the Workspace home page, click the App Builder icon.
   2. Select an application.
   3. Select a page.
   Page Designer appears.
2. In the Rendering tab, click item for which you want to define Help.
3. To find a group or attribute:

   • Search for the group or attribute - Enter keywords in the Filter Properties field. The Property Editor displays the group or attributes. To return to the default display, delete the keywords.

   • Use Go to Group - Click Go to Group and select the group. To return the default display, click Go to Group again and select Expand All.

4. In the Property Editor, findHelp and enter text in Help attribute.
5. Click Save.

6. Repeat the previous steps for each item requiring Help text.

Using the Bulk Edit Item Help Report

Edit all Help topics within an application at once using the Bulk Edit Item Help report

Developers can use the Bulk Edit Item Help report to view the item Label and Name, access the item, or link to the page containing the item.to the associate page

If you are including Help in your application, you can edit multiple Help topics at once using the Bulk Edit Item Help report.

To view the Bulk Edit Item Help report:

1. On the Workspace home page, click the App Builder icon.
2. Select an application.
3. Click the Utilities icon.
4. From Page Specific Utilities, select Item Utilities.
5. Click Grid Edit of All Item Help Text.
6. In Bulk Item Help Report, you can:

   • Update existing Help topics. Edit the Help text that appears and click Apply Changes.

   • Link to the page containing the item by clicking the page number.

   • Link to the Page Item by clicking the item name.

See Also:

"Seeding Item Help Topics"

Seeding Item Help Topics

For applications that do not yet contain Help, you can perform a mass update (or seed) of default Help text.

To seed Help topics:

1. On the Workspace home page, click the App Builder icon.
2. Select an application.
3. Click the Utilities icon.
4. From Page Specific Utilities, select Item Utilities.
5. Click Grid Edit of All Item Help Text.
6. Click Seed Item Help Text.
7. To edit existing item Help:
   1. In Item Help Text, enter the default text to appear in all Help topics.
   2. Click Apply Changes.
8. To create help text for all items that currently do not have help text, click Seed Item Help Text and follow the on-screen instructions.
9. Click Apply Changes.

Creating a Help Navigation Bar Entry

Once you have created your Help, the next step is to create a navigation bar entry so users can link to it.

To create a navigation bar entry:

1. Navigate to the Navigation Bar Entries page:

   1. Navigate to the Workspace home page.

   2. Click the App Builder icon.

   3. Select an application.

   4. On the Application home page, click Shared Components.

   5. Under Navigation, click Classic Navigation Bar Entries.

2. Click Create.
   The Create Navigation Bar Entry Wizard appears.
3. For Method, select From Scratch and click Next.
4. For Type, select Navigation to URL and click Next.
5. For Attributes, specify the following:

   1. Sequence - Specify the order of evaluation for this component.

   2. Entry Label - Enter display text for this navigation bar entry.

   3. Icon Image Name - Enter an image name. For naming conventions, see field-level Help.

   4. Image ALT - Enter ALT text for navigation icons that are images. If you do not specify an image name, then this text displays.

   5. Image Height - Defines the height of the image.

   6. Width - Defines the width of the image.

   7. Click Next.

6. For Target:

   1. Target is a - Select Page in this application.

   2. Page - Specify the page number of the help page you created in "Creating Help."

   3. Request - Enter the following:

      &APP_PAGE_ID.
      

      By specifying substitution string &APP_PAGE_ID as the Request, you are instructing the Application Express engine to display Help text for the current page when the user clicks this icon.

   4. Click Next.

7. To set a condition for displaying the navigation bar entry, select a condition type.
8. Click Create.