In general, help is text the user can request to help her understand a program. Context
sensitive help tries to guess just what questions the user would be asking herself at that particular stage of the
program. Java documentation and help tends to be based on HTML files.
Help with Applets
You probably came here to get help because one of the Canadian Mind Products utilities, Applets or web pages did not
work for you. Here are the most likely problems:
- If you are using Internet Explorer 7+ you must allow blocked content permission for Active X to run. This also
gives permission to Java to run.
- You need a very recent browser because this website depends on CSS 2 which is not even fully supported by the latest
browsers.
Get New Browser
- Each program is labelled with the version of Java it requires. However, I use only the latest Java myself, JDK 1.6.0_14.
This is the only version I test with. It is the version with the best chance of working. The CurrCon currency displays
requires Java 1.1+. The JDisplay program listings requires Java 1.2+. Just install the
latest Java and be done with it! You can keep the old version too if you like, just make sure your browser is
configured to us the latest one when you browse this website. You can find what version Java you are using with the Wassup
Applet. Why so much Java? This website is primarily about Java. I wanted to show off what you can do with it.
Get New Java
- After you have installed the latest Java, you should test it to make sure it is working.
Test Java
- For help getting the console visible so you can see error messages:
Engage Console
- For help with individual browsers see:
Help with Signed Applets and Java Web Start Apps
- When you use a signed Applet or signed Java Web Start application, sometimes Windows hides the dialog box where you give
permission for the program to run. Hit alt-Esc repeatedly to see if the grant/accept dialog
box is buried under something else.
- Signed Applets need your permission to break out of the sandbox and behave like ordinary programs to do things like read
and write disk or talk to arbitrary servers on the web, or set your clock. They will behave very strangely if you refuse
that permission. Different browsers ask permission various strange ways, but usually you have to click a button marked :
accept or grant.
Installing the Canadian Mindprod Certificate
If you want to reduce hassle with signed Applets, you can once and for all install the Canadian Mind Products code-signing
certificate and mark it is as trustworthy. All you have to do is click the button below:
install certificate
If that does not work, you can download the certificate and install it manually per the instructions under keytool.
Help With Java Web Start
- Java Web Start won’t work until you set up an association between the *.jnlp files (MIME application/x-java-jnlp-file)
and javaws.exe both in Windows and your browser. Both Sun and the browser makers have refused
to do this automatically. Growl!
-
- For help getting the Java Web Start (JWS) working:
Repair Java Web Start
Brute Force JWS
If you can’t get your browser to work with JWS (Java Web Start)
just save the *.jnlp file to disk and run it from the command line with something like:
The Windows Help Bug
With Vista, Microsoft dropped support for the old .hlp Windows help files. They wanted authors
to convert their programs to the new Vista .chm format and issue new Vista versions. Most
authors did not bother and help for old programs stopped working in Vista.
It was a bold planned obsolescence move, though they protest the motive was security. I am doubtful. They could have
changed the help viewer to disable any potentially dangerous feature.
So what do you do? You can ask the author to provide a Vista version, or you can convert the .hlp
files yourself to either .chh, .html, .pdf
etc. using an inexpensive Ambersoft ABC program.
Unfortunately, the new help won’t be integrated with the program to pop up in a context sensitive way. I could not
get Microsoft’s recommended kludge to work.
by Roedy Green ©1996-2009 Canadian Mind Products
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