IAssistance.ShowHelp Method (Office)
Displays the help topic specified by its ID in the Office Help Viewer or, for help topics that ship with Office, in the Help window of the current Office application.
Syntax
expression .ShowHelp(HelpId, Scope)
expression An expression that returns a IAssistance object.
Parameters
Name |
Required/Optional |
Data Type |
Description |
|---|---|---|---|
HelpId |
Optional |
String |
The ID of the help topic. |
Scope |
Optional |
String |
The namespace registered within the host application. |
Remarks
The Assistance property returns an IAssistance object. The IAssistance object exposes methods that allow developers to display help topics in the Office Help Viewer or to display help topics that ship with Office in the Help window of the host application. Developers either pass specific Help IDs to the help system or pass specific search queries. Help IDs have to be explicitly added to the Help file in order for the Help ID to return the help topic.
The following scopes are available within the Microsoft Office applications. By default, the scope is set to the current application's namespace if a Null string ("") is passed as a parameter.
Example
In the first line in the following example, the client help viewer will display the help topic associated with the ID "xlmain11.chm60407" in the "Excel" namespace. In the second line, the client viewer will remain open and display the help topic associated with the ID "65879", in the "Excel Developer" namespace.
Sub DisplayHelpTopic()
Application.Assistance.ShowHelp "xlmain11.chm60407", ""
Application.Assistance.ShowHelp "vbaxl10.chm65879", "DEV"
End Sub