Microsoft HTML Help vs xchm

Struggling to choose between Microsoft HTML Help and xchm? Both products offer unique advantages, making it a tough decision.

Microsoft HTML Help is a Office & Productivity solution with tags like help, documentation, authoring, html.

It boasts features such as Authoring tool to create HTML Help files, Supports HTML, images, multimedia, Context-sensitive help through special HTML tags, Full text search, Table of contents, Index, Hyperlinks, Integration with Visual Studio and Microsoft products and pros including Easy to create help content with HTML, Good integration with Microsoft ecosystem, Full text search allows quick access to content, Navigation features like TOC and index, Multimedia support allows images, audio, video etc, Wide adoption in Microsoft products.

On the other hand, xchm is a Office & Productivity product tagged with chm, viewer, microsoft, compiled-html.

Its standout features include Table of contents pane, Text searching, Indexing, Ability to print pages, and it shines with pros like Open source, Easy to use, Good CHM file support, Available on Linux.

Feature	Microsoft HTML Help	xchm
Overall Score	N/A	N/A
Primary Category	Office & Productivity	Office & Productivity

Product Overview

Microsoft HTML Help

Description: Microsoft HTML Help is a Microsoft proprietary format for writing help content. It allows creating help files with HTML, providing features like full text search, index, table of contents. It integrates with Visual Studio and other Microsoft products.

xchm

Description: xchm is an open-source CHM file viewer for Linux. It allows users to easily view Microsoft Compiled HTML (.chm) documents. Some key features include a table of contents pane, text searching, indexing, and the ability to print pages.

Key Features Comparison

Microsoft HTML Help Features

• Authoring tool to create HTML Help files
• Supports HTML, images, multimedia
• Context-sensitive help through special HTML tags
• Full text search
• Table of contents
• Index
• Hyperlinks
• Integration with Visual Studio and Microsoft products

xchm Features

• Table of contents pane
• Text searching
• Indexing
• Ability to print pages

Pros & Cons Analysis

Microsoft HTML Help

Pros

• Easy to create help content with HTML
• Good integration with Microsoft ecosystem
• Full text search allows quick access to content
• Navigation features like TOC and index
• Multimedia support allows images, audio, video etc
• Wide adoption in Microsoft products

Cons

• Proprietary format limited to Microsoft platform
• Limited styling capabilities compared to HTML/CSS
• Not responsive for mobile devices
• Lacks features of newer help formats like responsive UI, embedded videos etc
• Authoring requires Microsoft HTML Help Workshop
• Not actively developed anymore

xchm

Pros

• Open source
• Easy to use
• Good CHM file support
• Available on Linux

Cons

• Limited features compared to proprietary options
• Few customization options
• No support for other file types

Pricing Comparison

Microsoft HTML Help

• Free
• One-time Purchase

xchm

• Open Source