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#299283 - 28/06/2007 06:23 Re: Vista pains [Re: gbeer]
andy carpal tunnel Registered: 10/06/1999 Posts: 5914 Loc: Wivenhoe, Essex, UK	The removal of the WinHelp viewer could also be to reduce security concerns. They have had to patch WinHelp so so many times over the years, I suspect there is no real way to make it secure without throwing it away or re-engineering it which would probably break a load of help files anyway. _________________________ Remind me to change my signature to something more interesting someday
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#299284 - 28/06/2007 11:53 Re: Vista pains [Re: andy]
wfaulk carpal tunnel Registered: 25/12/2000 Posts: 16706 Loc: Raleigh, NC US	WinHelp has security problems? For God's sake, it's a f'n text viewer. _________________________ Bitt Faulk
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#299285 - 28/06/2007 12:11 Re: Vista pains [Re: wfaulk]
andy carpal tunnel Registered: 10/06/1999 Posts: 5914 Loc: Wivenhoe, Essex, UK	Quote: WinHelp has security problems? For God's sake, it's a f'n text viewer. WinHelp has had massive security problems. They stem from the fact that it uses the IE rendering engine for its HTML based help files. It first used the IE rendering engine in more innocent times, which left it wide open to all sorts of security holes. They have patched it and patched it but they still find new problems. One of the recent patches involved stopping users opening random HTML help files without first setting a property on the file in explorer. If you copy an HTML help file from a file share to your local machine now it won't display the contents until you have jumped through some hoops to tell Windows to allow you to open that HTML help file. Fun eh ? Edit: And it isn't just a text viewer, it is a hypertext viewer with support for scripting, ActiveX controls etc ...and yes, it's a mess. Edited by andy (28/06/2007 12:18) _________________________ Remind me to change my signature to something more interesting someday
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#299286 - 28/06/2007 12:39 Re: Vista pains [Re: andy]
peter carpal tunnel Registered: 13/07/2000 Posts: 4174 Loc: Cambridge, England	Quote: WinHelp has had massive security problems. They stem from the fact that it uses the IE rendering engine for its HTML based help files. Replacing the original Windows Help with the HTML stuff was one of the most arrogant and user-contemptuous things I've ever seen Microsoft do, which is saying something. The release notes at the time (1995? 96?) said something like "This isn't yet as good as the thing it replaces, but we've replaced it anyway because we can make it better later." Thanks, but I'd rather have waited until you had something as good as what you were replacing... the first version of HTML Help wasn't even capable of scrolling down a single page when you pressed Page Down -- it scrolled down a page-and-a-half, so you had to scroll up a bit again to hunt for the bit you were reading. I can't imagine what was going through the head of anyone who thought it was shippable in that condition. Peter
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#299287 - 28/06/2007 12:51 Re: Vista pains [Re: peter]
andy carpal tunnel Registered: 10/06/1999 Posts: 5914 Loc: Wivenhoe, Essex, UK	Quote: Replacing the original Windows Help with the HTML stuff was one of the most arrogant and user-contemptuous things I've ever seen Microsoft do, which is saying something. If I remember rightly they managed to break context sensitive help for VB6 at the same time, which was a huge pain in the arse. _________________________ Remind me to change my signature to something more interesting someday
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