About the IPF Editor

Create Context Sensitive Help In Minutes, Not Days!
        The IPF Editor 2.12 was designed to make the process of adding help to new and existing OS/2 applications easy and painless. Using it you can literally add help to an application in less than five minutes! The IPF Editor 2.12 will analyze your application and generate every IPF panel required as well as create the necessary help resource tables and C functions required to add help to your application. And with the IPF Editor 2.12 you can now choose to use its improved functionality to add help to an OS/2 application merely by linking in one C file and adding two function calls to your program's main function. It's that simple!

       

Create IPF Documents from WordProcessing and HTML Files
        The IPF Editor 2.12 supports importing wordprocessing files from WordPerfect, Describe, and any other wordprocessor that can export an RTF file. Plus the IPF Editor 2.12 supports a tagged ASCII format. This lets developers and authors create one document for print and use the exact same document for their online documentation. The IPF Editor 2.12 RTF import has been called the best they've ever tried for converting to IPF from RTF by our customers.

The IPF Editor 2.12 also supports importing HTML files and converting them to IPF documents.

Create HTML Web Pages from IPF Documents!
        The IPF Editor 2.12 fully supports creating HTML files from IPF documents. HTML files created can use the original HTML, HTML 2.0 and plus variants based on what you need. Background graphics support, complete conversion of ALL IPF tags to their HTML counterparts, conversion of all symbols, tables, and hypertext links. Plus add your own custom copyright notices, page footers, mailing addresses, create a web site table of contents, and more!

       

Panel Creation Made Easy!
        Creating panels using res number attributes has traditionally been a tedious and sometimes difficult task. Not with the IPF Editor 2.12! It can automatically generate res and name attributes for every panel you create and guarantees no duplicates! In addition, the IPF Editor 2.12 provides support for every panel heading attribute so you never have to look at the IPF language manual.

       

Creating footnotes has never been easier!
        The IPF Editor 2.12 makes footnote creation nearly automatic. Simple select the text you wish to create a footnote for, hit the footnote command, and then fill in the footnote's text in the provided entry window.

       

Preview Panel Appearance without Compiling!
        The IPF Editor 2.12 contains a Panel Preview that really shows you what your panels will look like without having to use the IPF Compiler. Nearly every tag and attribute are supported by the Preview and as we improve the preview free updates for it will be available from PCS.
       

Index Creation - Automatically
        You can choose to create an index entry for your document every time you create a panel with the IPF Editor 2.12. The advanced index creation aids make creating both primary and secondary index entries simple and error free. Support for all IPF index entry attributes are available at the click of your mouse.

       

Create IPF Tables From Lotus And Microsoft Spreadsheets
        The IPF Editor 2.12 will also convert Lotus 1-2-3 Release 2.0 for OS/2 and Microsoft Excel spreadsheets into IPF file tables. And editing existing tables or creating new IPF tables is also simple with the advanced IPF Editor 2.12 table creation and editing capailities.

       

Add Push Buttons to IPF Documents Easily
        The IPF Editor 2.12 lets you define push buttons using an intuitive interface that doesn't require you to understand the subtle complexities of the ":pbutton." and ":acviewport" commands. You can add push buttons to cause other panels to appear or follow the easy to understand online help to really customize push button usage. Plus, you can easily select which standard push buttons to display at the bottom of your IPF document or help.

       

Customized Document Placement and
Sizing
        The IPF Editor 2.12 provides an easy to use DLL that will let you determine how big and where the VIEW or Help Manager will display your IPF document on the screen. In addition, you can even choose to have your Table Of Contents be displayed in a separate window from your IPF panels using the advanced features of the IPF Editor 2.12. You can also choose to remove the VIEW program's menu to provide more display space, hide the VIEW coverpage, and more! Flexibility and power is at your fingertips!

       

Create Hypertext Links Easily
        The IPF Editor makes creating hypertext links easy and you can do it using one of two methods:

       

Drag and Drop Linking
        By selecting specific phrases in your document and then dragging panels from the Panel List (see the preview page for details on these IPF Editor 2.12 features) or by linking to them automatically as discussed in the next section.

       

Create Hypertext Links Automatically
        The Automatic hypertext linking feature of the IPF Editor 2.12 will generate hypertext links for you with no effort from you at all. Its advanced analysis functions will scan your documents and create hypertext links quickly and easily. 
       

Add Graphics and Create Hypergraphics Links Quickly and Easily!
        The IPF Editor 2.12 fully supports adding bitmap and metafile graphics to IPF documents and help. You can choose to drag and drop graphics files onto the desired panel or use the advanced graphics support commands to add the graphics easily. And creating hypergraphics links to other panels in your documents has never been easier. Simply use you mouse to mark the section of the graphics to use for a link and select the panel to link to. Never again will you need to figure out the exact percentage of a graphics figure to use as the hypergraphics link box. The IPF Editor 2.12 will handle it all for you!

       

Eliminate Spelling Errors!
        The IPF Editor 2.12 Spell Checker has a 100,000 plus word dictionary that will help you create spelling error free documents quickly and easily. It is easily customizable so you can add words to the dictionary that will meet your specific needs for those with scientific or foreign language requirements.

       

Create Complex Multiple Panel Displays Easily!
        The IPF Editor 2.12 Panel Grouping Workspace(TM) (not shown) lets you create multiple panel displays using an intuitive interface. Now you just drag the panel you want into the Panel Grouping Workspace, position it in the size and position that you desire, then click "Save". The IPF Editor 2.12 does the rest. Version 2.1 supports grouping "styles" that you can use to quickly create groupings using several predefined layouts making the process even easier and faster!

       

Add Music and Voice To Any Panel
        The IPF Editor 2.12's Voice Support Module fully supports adding MIDI music and WAV voice files to any IPF document or help. And unlike other competing products it gracefully handles target systems that do not have MMPM/2 installed when the end-user views the document. Complete control over volume levels, play sequence, repetitions, etc. is provided!

       

Link to Video, OS/2 Applications, and other Documents Easily
        The IPF Editor 2.12 makes creating hypertext links to other documents, applications, even digital video movies easy. The advanced linking functions let you quickly mark the text to use for the link and then associate the desired action (video, application, or document) in seconds.

       

Integrated IPF Compiler Control Panel
        The IPF Editor 2.12 tremendously simplifies running the IPF compiler. The IPF Compiler Control Panel provides support for every IPF compiler option, even explaining what each is for. And if a compile error occurs, the IPF Editor 2.12 will send you to the error so urce at the click of a mouse button!

       

Toolbox Configurable To Meet Your Needs
        You can now select which tools you wish displayed in the toolbox, as well as how and where the tools appear. The toolbox can be sized and positioned to any location on your OS/2 desktop. There are tools for most IPF tags. This greatly simplifies common tasks.

       

Complete User's Guide and Reference Provided
        The IPF Editor 2.12 User's Guide and Reference (provided in both hardcopy and as an online INF VIEW file) makes using the IPF Editor 2.12 really easy. The walk-throughs show how to get the most out of the system and the learning curve is anything but steep! Most users are up and producing professional quality documents in under an hour. Of course if you'd like further help documents are provided online that answer common questions and answers, explain in depth some of the subtle details of adding help to applications (to further expand upon the instructions provided in the User's Guide and Reference).

In addition, several example documents and C applications are provided to make the process of learning IPF even easier!

Finally, to really make using the IPF Editor 2.12 a pleasant and easy experience, we have included complete context sensitive help for every feature in theIPF Editor 2.12. This means that when you want help on something the help is available, immediately! Plus, we have added in a "smart" help that watches what you are doing and if you get confused, will tell you what options are available to you at that time and how to use them!

Who's Using the IPF Editor?
        Join many of the leading banks, credit card companies, Lockeed and NASA, IBM personnel, the European Patent office, hundreds of OS/2 Application developers, and even members of the IBM IPF Development team who have selected the IPF Editor for their IPF creation needs.

       

Considered the Best IPF Development tool
        The IPF Editor 2.12 has been called the best IPF development tool ever by customers who have tried the competition and switched to the IPF Editor. Not only has the IPF Editor 2.12 been around longer than any of the competition, but it is constantly being improved (as shown by version 2.11, just released). And unlike other competitors, if we discover a bug we give registered customers the update, free! We have had hundreds of customers write or call telling us that they are really satisfied with theIPF Editor 2.12! Why not join them and make IPF creation easy?

       

Unparalleled Technical Support
        PCS has a tradition of providing some of the finest technical support in the software industry. We take pride in the software we produce and want to make using it a pleasure. We feel that software that doesn't make the job easier isn't worth anything, so we go out of our way to make sure that the software is as bug-free as possible and meets the needs of our customers. We welcome input from all of our customers on what they want to see in new versions of the IPF Editor 2.12.