Generating HTML source for command documentation

To generate Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML) information to be viewed using a browser from your online help, use the Generate Command Documentation (GENCMDDOC) command and specify *HTML for the GENOPT (Generation Options) parameter.

In addition to creating help information for your command, you might want to create command documentation that can be viewed either when you are not connected to a system running the i5/OS® operating system or when the information is printed. The i5/OS operating system allows you to generate command documentation in HTML source that can be displayed using an Internet browser, or imported into many word processing programs. To do this, you can use the Generate Command Documentation (GENCMDDOC) command, specifying *HTML for the GENOPT (Generation Options) parameter. The command generates a file that contains information that is retrieved from the command object (*CMD) that you specify and any command help panel group (*PNLGRP) objects that already exist for the command.

To see what the HTML output looks like and how it matches the online help, compare the help for any command and the CL command documentation provided in the i5/OS Information Center. IBM builds the Information Center command documentation from the online command help.

The following is an example of using the Generate Command Documentation (GENCMDDOC) command to generate HTML source:
GENCMDDOC   CMD(MYLIB/MYCMD) 

In this example, the command retrieves information from the command object named MYCMD in library MYLIB and generates HTML source into stream file MYLIB_MYCMD.HTML in the current working directory of the job. The generated stream file can be viewed in HTML source format using the Display File (DSPF) command, or in HTML browser format using any standard internet browser software, or by command.