ICommander Manuals are Integrated into the ICommander Menu System. The Manual
Section relating to the menu you are presently viewing may be accessed by either
pressing the F1-Key for Help or clicking on the Help button on the ICommander
Toolbar. The second item on the drop-down list of Help Options presented will
be "Read Manual-this Menu". Most of the detailed manual pages relate to File
Maintenance and Transaction Entry programs. The purpose of each field is
explained with notes about various options.
Detailed Specific Program Help
The Manual Section applicable to a File Maintenance or Transaction Entry screen may also be accessed while you are in the entry program. Use either Ctrl-R (for Read Manual) or click on the Help button on the ICommander Toolbar. The manual details are accessed using the powerful Vim Editor. This includes the ability to search (simply enter a / and then the word(s) or item number you are interested in to jump to that area) and navigate using the same Vim commands used to explore reports.When the manual detail is accessed from the entry program, exit from viewing the online information returns you to the entry screen from which you accessed it. If you want a printout of the manual detail, use the first method as you will then have an option to spool (print) the manual section when you exit from viewing it.
This System Help Options
The complete ICommander Manuals consist of several components, all of which may be accessed from any menu. The F1-Key and Toolbar Help button gives you access to the various components. The "This System-I&P Topics" choice on the drop-down menu will display any Implementation and Processing topics for the current system. The I&P Topics are aimed at a broader explanation of using the current system in comparison to the detail entry screen documentation. If a complete overview of using the system is available, it will be under the "IMPL&PROC" topic when the I&P Topics are displayed. Other I&P Topics about particular areas may also be listed. If I&P Topics specific to your use of this ICommander System have been added to the standard ICommander I&P Topics, they will also be displayed. Various Help Choices such as the I&P Topics may also be accessed via a "Secret" Menu Choice. The number in parentheses at the end of the drop-down menu is the choice that will go directly to the help category (87 in the case of the I&P topics).The "This System-Help Topics" help option will display a list of Help Topics available. This will normally include an "OVERVIEW" topic which has a summary of features of the current system. You may also see an "HOW-TO" topic. Points covered in the HOW-TO are in a question and answer format without extensive detail (with reference to I&P Topics or other sources of more detail on some points covered).
The "This System-Program Help" will list all programs which have detailed manual sections. This is the same information that you access when requested from the menu on which the program is located or while within the program.
Each Help Option will give you the option to spool (print) the Help Information when you exit back to the Menu System.
System-Wide Help Options
The "System-Wide-I&P Topics" Help Option will display the six standard appendices and a REPORTS section that are included whenever a complete ICommander System Manual is printed. The information presented is common to all systems (why it is labelled "System-Wide").The "System-Wide-Help Topics" Help Option will display a list of topics that apply to all systems. This is one of several ways to get to the information about the "Secret" Menu Choices and Keys (which aren't really secret once you read the information presented). The System-Wide Help Topics also include a "GEN-OPER-INST" topic which may be useful to print and review when you first start using ICommander. Using ICommander is simple to learn but there may be many features that you will find useful for added efficiency in using it by reading the information presented here.
The "OVERVIEW" System-Wide Help Topic is an overview of common system features across all systems. You may find it useful to review this when considering security and use of ICommander on initial implementation.
Help Topics Menu
The first item on the drop-down list of Help Options is the Help Topics Menu. You should access this and go into the only menu choice initially available for "ICommander Standard Help Topics". The menu choices here are installed and updated as a part of the ICommander Install/Update process. They include some very useful information about using Vim, Free-Form Data Extraction Programs, etc. Also included is Contact Information for ICommander Corporation.The rest of the Help Topics Menu is available for you to add choices that point to documentation specific to your use of ICommander. It may also be used for a myriad of other purposes (see the descriptions relating to File Manager, Staff Communications, and Online Resources).
Printing the Complete Manuals
If you prefer to have a printed version of the entire ICommander Manuals, this is easily done from the first level of hidden System Selection Menus. The System Selection Menu is the first one you see upon logging onto ICommander. It lists the application systems installed on your server and lets user access them to perform the various accounting tasks. Most users are setup to have access to the first level of "hidden" menus here. ICommander installs six standard choices on the first hidden menu (accessed by holding the Shift Key down and then pressing the F8-Key (End-Key)). One of the standard menu choices here is "Print Manuals & Other Documentation". The first choice on the menu called by that choice is "Print ICommander Manuals".You may print the entire manual for any system installed on your server but you also have the option of printing only certain sections. The system-wide information in the manuals is the same for every system so you may not want to reprint it for all of them. We recommend that you spool the manual instead of printing directly. That way you can see how many pages are involved to decide whether you really want a hard copy. You may want to use the ICommander Print Utility to convert the printout to a PDF File instead.
The ICommander Manuals are divided into standard sections with the Menus and Documentation section separated between Master Files, Routine Processing, and Period-End Processing. If you do print a hard copy, you may want to request a set of divider tabs from ICommander Corporation to insert in a binder. The system-specific detailed program documentation is indexed by the Menu Choices within the three areas mentioned.
The menu with the option for printing the ICommander Manuals also has a choice
to "Print Menu Maps". As the name implies, this is a printout of the menus for
a system which will be in order by menu number and show what program or sub-menu
is called from the ICommander menus. This will also be several pages but may be
more manageable for reviewing all the options available instead of the full
manual with documentation. You also have an option to output the menus to a
HTML Web Page, if you would prefer exploring with your browser.