Based on a cut-down browser, Help Viewer, Apple Help in Mac OS X has had its ups and downs, and several internal revisions, the latest of which is the Tips app in Sequoia.
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If you’re looking for good advice on Macs, Apple’s support documentation is often limited, and the Tips app has a long way to go before it’s useful. Why not try ChatGPT? Six case studies might be helpful.
In Sequoia, the Tips app has shot from being hidden in CoreServices to join Apple’s first league apps in the main Applications folder. Is this real change, or merely cosplay?
Help has been in steady decline since macOS 10.13. More recently, when you open a Help book on an Intel Mac it may get buried, but it doesn’t on M-series Macs. Why?
Swift/SwiftUI source code to accompany article on adding a PDF Help file to a SwiftUI app for macOS.
An explanation of how to implement the Help command, and how to use that to display a PDF document in a SwiftUI View.
Confess, identify, solution, damage limitation, and reference – key elements in the information an app needs to provide the user when an error occurs.
All about helpd and HelpViewer, how they index and maintain Help books. And what has gone wrong recently, including an odd difference between Intel and Apple silicon Macs.
Something wrong with your Mac? Why not ask ChatGPT, or the new Bing, to diagnose it and recommend a solution?
Writing good documentation often takes longer than coding and testing. Is it a good investment of time when documentation seems so little used? Is there a better way?
The Eclectic Light Company 