Fast-Help is developed under Vista and works with all versions of Vista, while retaining backwards compatibility with XP, Windows 2000, Windows 2003 Server and Windows 95.

Say goodbye to WinHelp

Microsoft decided to drop support for WinHelp in Vista. WinHelp was last updated in 1997, so it is ancient in computing terms, but is still used in many programs and will be missed. Anyway, nostalgia aside, we have to move on.

Fast-Help will still compile to WinHelp, but you will not be able to view your HLP files on Vista. You will need to copy them to XP etc, in order to view them.

The recommended alternative to WinHelp is HtmlHelp, i.e. CHM files. Because Fast-Help is a single-source editor, you can simply compile to any of the 7 compile formats. This will also be the same with any new compile formats that we add, thereby protecting your investment in your help text.

Turning on WinHelp Options under Vista

Fast-Help will automatically hide WinHelp options under Vista, but you can enable them from the "Project Settings" screen by checking the "Show WinHelp Options under Vista" option.