3 ways to speed-up hyperlink creation in your help file, user manual or eBook

Technical writers are spending a lot of time making sure that the content they are writing is relevant, clear, and concise so they should not have to waste time operating their favorite help authoring software when they need to perform common tasks such as creating hyperlinks. Fortunately, the HelpNDoc help authoring tool provides multiple ways to speed up hyperlink creation, thus helping technical writers spend their time where it matters the most: writing great content.

Use keyboard shortcuts to quickly create hyperlinks to topics or URLs

As writers’ hands are mostly placed over the keyboard to enter content, the fastest way to create hyperlinks should be to use keyboard shortcuts.

The HelpNDoc help authoring tool includes powerful keyboard shortcuts to create hyperlinks. To link to another topic, hit the CTRL + SPACE keys, start typing the caption of the topic, and hit the ENTER key to validate: a link to that topic is now automatically created.
To link to an Internet address or URL, simply start typing it (e.g., “https://” or “http://”) and once again, hit the CTRL + SPACE keys to open the auto-completion popup. Once the URL is fully specified, validate using the ENTER key to validate.

Filter topics in the “Insert hyperlink” dialog

HelpNDoc’s “Insert hyperlink” dialog displays a list of all topics available in the current project. For large projects, it could be hard to locate the topic to link to. Let’s filter it…

The “Insert hyperlink” dialog can be shown using one of those actions:

In the “Insert” ribbon tab, click the “Hyperlink…” button
Or right-click in the topic editor then click “Insert hyperlink”
Or hit the CTRL + L keyboard shortcut when the topic editor is focused

To filter topics in the “Insert hyperlink” dialog:

Focus the “Topic to link to…” tree by clicking in it
Hit the CTRL + F keyboard shortcut to show the filter box
Type some letters or words which are part of the topic’s caption

This only shows topics whose caption contains those letters or words. Select the desired topic and click OK to create a link to that topic.

Locate topics in the “Insert hyperlink” dialog

Without filtering the whole tree, it is possible to quickly locate a topic by typing the start of its caption.

To quickly locate a specific topic in the “Insert hyperlink” dialog:

Focus the “Topic to link to…” tree by clicking in it
Start typing the first letters of its caption: the first topic with those letters will be automatically selected

Once selected, click OK to create a link to that topic.

Thanks to those useful shortcuts, technical writers can optimize their time to concentrate on content instead of operating a help authoring software. Those are only some of the tools available in HelpNDoc: check the various tips and tricks to learn more about its capabilities and how it can help produce the most amazing help files, user manuals and eBooks, and download you free copy now to get started.