I am working with HTML Help sources that were generated by converting an older WinHelp help sources (converted from the .RTF files that were edited with Word using a Microsoft conversion tool). This source has not been touched since it was converted and some preliminary work done sometime around 2014 or earlier.
I am currently using Visual Studio 2005 with a Windows 7 PC to update this HTML Help source. I have created a project and added all the various sources: HTML files, BMP files containing images, a file containing JavaScript and a file containing CSS. The older WinHELP based content used a lot of popups which the conversion put into individual files and by just merging these small files used in only a single place, I have reduced the number of files by a third.
The first thing I am doing is cleaning up tags by hand, eliminating files by merging and rewriting content, and changing the old style markup to use more modern CSS.
My target for the help files is desktop users of Windows 7 and Windows 10. I am planning to move to Visual Studio 2015 with this source once I have the basics cleaned up. I have done a test project converting the VS 2005 to VS 2015 and the conversion seemed to work fine and the HTML source to compile into a .chm file that was usable.
From what I can find, it appears that HTML Help Workshop from Microsoft is being maintained but is no longer under active development. The last version seems to be 1.32 published in 2012 though it is for HTML Help version 1.4 according to the HTML Help Workshop and Documentation download page. See also Microsoft HTML Help 1.4 in Microsoft Docs.
Visual Studio 2005 is indicating that some of the markup, which I think is HTML4, is deprecated. The html help source seems to compile to a .chm
file fine anyway and the resulting .chm file works fine under Windows 7.
I am a bit confused about this compiling process. My impression is that the workshop compiler packs all of the various .html files together along with a couple of files it generates and then compresses it all into a single archive.
Does this mean that the HTML standard I use depends on the Microsoft browser, Edge I assume, and what HTML standard it supports?
This question really means is there any dependency in the HTML Help Workshop that means I can not use HTML5 or the newer CSS?
There is some, simple Javascript which uses div
tags for some basic user interaction. That works just fine. Can I expect that whatever Javascript HTML DOM is supported by Microsoft Edge is available for use with this help text?