help.start               package:utils               R Documentation

_H_y_p_e_r_t_e_x_t _D_o_c_u_m_e_n_t_a_t_i_o_n

_D_e_s_c_r_i_p_t_i_o_n:

     Start the hypertext (currently HTML) version of R's online
     documentation.

_U_s_a_g_e:

     help.start(gui = "irrelevant", browser = getOption("browser"),
                remote = NULL, searchEngine = FALSE)

_A_r_g_u_m_e_n_t_s:

     gui: just for compatibility with S-PLUS.

 browser: the name of the program to be used as hypertext browser. It
          should be in the 'PATH', or a full path specified.
          Alternatively, it can be a function which will be called with
          an URL as its only argument. 

  remote: A character giving a valid URL for the 'R_HOME' directory on
          a remote location.

searchEngine: logical: if true go directly to the search engine page. 
          A workaround for some Firefox 3 versions (see 'Notes').

_D_e_t_a_i_l_s:

     All the packages in the known library trees are linked to
     directory '.R' in the per-session temporary directory.  The links
     are re-made each time 'make.packages.html' or 'help.start' is run,
     which should be done after packages are installed, updated or
     removed.

     A side effect is to set 'options(htmlhelp = TRUE)' so that future
     help requests (by default) are sent to the browser.

     If the browser named by the 'browser' argument is different from
     the default browser as specified by 'options("browser")', the
     default is changed to the given browser so that it gets used for
     all future help requests.  (This only holds when 'browser' is a
     name, not a function.)

_N_o_t_e:

     There is a Java-based search facility available from the HTML page
     that 'help.start' brings up.  Should this not work, please consult
     the 'R Installation and Administration' manual which is linked
     from that page.

     Note to users of Firefox 3.0 to 3.0.6: the search results have
     links that are resolved incorrectly by that browser if starting
     from the normal HTML index page.  The workaround is to start with
     'help.start(searchEngine = TRUE)'.  This was fixed in Firefox
     3.0.7.

_S_e_e _A_l_s_o:

     'help()' for on- and off-line help in ASCII/Editor or PostScript
     format.

     'browseURL' for how the help file is displayed.

     'RSiteSearch' to access an on-line search of R resources.

_E_x_a_m_p_l_e_s:

     ## Not run: 
     help.start()
     ## End(Not run)