General tab

The General tab contains properties which:

• Are common across to Book and Topic objects.
• Uniquely identify an object.
• Are used internally rather than in any output formats.

Object Code

Unique identifier for the object, which you cannot change. This number can be used for linking topics when you're producing context-sensitive Help. The number does not change if you create versions of the object.

Object Description

Defines a descriptive name for the object. This description will be displayed as the name of the object throughout Author-it.

You should enter a description that will make your objects easy to identify and find. In some object types, the description is copied to other properties when you first create the object. For example, in the Topic object the text is copied to the Document Heading, Help Heading, and the HTML Heading properties.

Note: If you update the object description on the General tab the changes are not copied to the output tabs.

Based On

Allows you to choose the template on which the object will be based. The names that appear in this list are derived from the Description property of an object template. The object templates that appear may depend on your security access.

Include Object In

Determines what published output the object will be included in.

• Print: applies to Word and PDF
• Help: applies to WinHelp, HTML Help, JavaHelp, and Oracle Help for Java
• Web: applies to HTML and XHTML

Release State

Allows you to choose the release state applied to the object.

Object Version

Contains a read-only unique version number for each version of an object. The Object Code will not change from one version of an object to another.

Object Status

A read-only text property that contains the current status of the version of the object. A version of an object can move through several different states during its life cycle.