Silverlight 2, Beta 1 - Setting up Local Help Resource

Today I learned a trick on how to configure the local help documentation for Silverlight 2.0 Beta 1. Here are the instructions:

Instructions

Prerequisites

You should already have installed the development tools for VS 2008 / Silverlight Beta 1. If you have not, see my getting started post.

Step #1: Download the complete help file

http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=111131

Step #2: Place help file into correct folder

Navigate to the “C:\Program Files\Microsoft SDKs\Silverlight\v2.0\Documentation\Help” folder. You will notice that “SilverlightDocumentation.chm” is only a dummy file.

To correct this place an extracted version of the newly downloaded help file from step #1 into this folder.

Step #3: Configure VS 2008 to use the new help file

Follow these steps to configure Visual Studio 2008:

• Open Visual Studio 2008 as an administrator.
• In the Help menu, choose Index.
  • Microsoft Document Explorer displays.
• In the “Filtered by”: drop-down, choose (unfiltered).
• In the Look for field, type “Collection Manager”.
• Below the Collection Manager heading, double click Help.
• Below the “Collections available for inclusion in VSCC” heading, check “Microsoft Silverlight 2 SDK Documentation”.
• Click “Update VSCC”

Conclusion

Your local help should now work as expected.

Credit: I learned this trick by reading the manual for a hands-on lab posted in this blog entry.