[Lazarus] Extending FCL documentation

[Michael Schnell]

On 02/08/2012 09:01 AM, Graeme Geldenhuys wrote:
>   * Help hints over source code, are read directly from the XML files.
>     This is simply
>     done because NO HELP SYSTEM IS IN PLACE. Yet another duck-tape solution.
Would DocView as a primary Help viewer be able to support Help hints in 
the current or an even  better way ?
> ... extending the IDE to read those help files instead of
> parsing unoptimised XML files.
Are there decent chances to allow the users to select DocView as their 
primary help viewer in the IDE (rather than install it as an external 
tool) ?
> The bottom line is, the Lazarus Core team needs to grow a pair and
> make a decision for their project, and decide what help system and
> offline help viewer they want to use.
IMHO, forcing a decision is always bad, as long as there still are 
possibilities to allow for flexibility.

Why not extend the Tool interface (or derive  an additional special 
"helpviewer" interface from same) and handle the help viewer as a 
selectable external Tool, similar to what can be done with DocView right 
now, but maybe a little bit better integrated. By this the "online help 
viewer" can still be selected and be improved as a separate project.

-Michael