Settings Can Be Imported from Other Projects
Some settings in Dr.Explain are very detailed and can take a while to set up. Once you do spend that time, the settings themselves can now have shelf life and be used in other projects. One example is that you can have a large number of coordinated call-out styles all accessible via a few clicks from within the
Annotation Designer. Another example is that you can have very detailed, coordinated set of Screen Capture Scenario settings that govern how callouts are generated for screenshots being captured from running Windows applications. Once a set of these groups of detailed settings is set up, it can be very handy to be able to save them externally, and/or pull them into other projects so that all the work done to set them up is preserved and can be applied to other projects.
Importing Settings from Other Projects:
All Dr.Explain project settings grouped into categories. All such categories can be selectively imported from other projects via the Options > Import Settings... menu option, which opens the Import Project Settings dialog box. In this dialog box, each such group can be checked or unchecked to be imported from another project into the project currently selected. Note that the other projects do not need to be already open, because the dialog box permits you to select them from their .gui file.
The settings categories that can be thus imported are:
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Common
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Screen Capturing (sub-part Capturing Scenario can be imported/exported to/from .des1 file)
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Screenshot Annotating (sub-part Annotation Template for one callout can be imported/exported to/from .dea1 file)
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HTML Export
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Sitemap
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Comments and Sharing
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Publishing
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CHM Export
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Help ID Management
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CHM Compiler
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RTF Export
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PDF Export
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Text Settings
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Variables
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Formatting Styles
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All of these settings groups can be individually imported from an external project from the Project Settings dialog for the applicable settings group via the Actions button or Import Settings button in the upper-right corner of the window.
Some of these settings categories can be imported from other parts of Dr.Explain as well. Among these are:
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Settings Group
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Accessed From
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Actions Possible
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Formatting Styles
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Content Editor > Style > Edit...
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Import Settings from .gui1 file
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Annotation Designer Settings (a.k.a. Screenshot Annotating)
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Annotation Designer2 > Annotation Designer Settings toolbar button
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Actions button > Import Settings from .gui1 file
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Exporting / Importing Settings to/from External Template Files:
Two subsets of these setting groups can also be exported as "settings templates" in external files thus can be later imported into other projects. These include:
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Settings Group
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Accessed From
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Actions Possible
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Screen Capture Scenario Export (rules involved in creating callouts during screen captures)
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Project Settings > Screen Capturing > Capturing Scenario > Edit
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Export Settings to .des1 file.
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Screen Capture Scenario Import (rules involved in creating callouts during screen captures)
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Project Settings > Screen Capturing > Capturing Scenario
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Select Scenario (.des1 file) from dropdown list.
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Annotation Template (the settings representing ONE callout style)
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Annotation Designer > Annotation Designer Settings > Edit (under desired Annotation Template icon in 2nd row of icons)
or Project Settings > Screenshot Annotating
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Load Annotation Template, -
Export Annotation Template to File.
(Both of these are small buttons in upper left corner of window and deal with .dea1 files.)
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Notes:
1. Dr.Explain file types are in the table below.
2. Enter Annotation Designer by double-clicking on the
screenshot image in a
screenshot layout page, clicking on the
Edit the Screenshot Annotation button at its base, or right-clicking the image and selecting the
Edit... option.
File Types:
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Extension
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Description
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.gui
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Dr.Explain Project (contains all elements to generate output documents)
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.dea
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Annotation Template (contains all settings for ONE callout style)
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.des
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Screenshot Scenario Settings
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