Solved: PS 2018 documentation? - Page 2

David_DiLaura1 · ‎09-19-2017

Colleagues,

I installed PS 2018, interfacing with VS 2015. What happened to the Fortran documentation? It is no longer available via the F1 key -- a window appears saying I have to download it. I followed the link to the program download page in the registration center but can't find the documentation.

Steve_Lionel · ‎09-21-2017

Unfortunately, that's not the way most commercial software is developed. I have seen the occasional survey of possible changes, but Intel has not had a history of doing that. I left Intel before learning of this proposed change, so I don't know who made the decision or why. The evidence suggests, though, that there was a disconnect between departments (the product is composed of pieces managed by a dozen or so different groups), and I theorize that the "product manager" for the compiler was in fact unaware that context-sensitive help would go away. I'd go farther and suggest that this was not planned by anyone, but rather a crucial development piece was missed. This is all speculation - I have no inside info on this.

That said, Intel Parallel Studio beta tests are supposed to be "feature complete" at beta start. ("supposed to be", but often aren't.) Beta feedback is very important, and if beta customers had complained from the start about lack of F1 help, or lack of installed documentation, I'm pretty sure something would have changed. You know, of course, that you can use the beta alongside the released version.

On Windows, the documentation issue is complicated by Microsoft changing the documentation format incompatibly from VS release to release. I know that this is extremely painful for the Intel doc team and it might be that they just didn't have the tools or resources to deliver integrated documentation for all three supported VS versions. Again, just my personal theory.

I am confident that Devorah, or someone else on the Intel support team, will pass on this feedback to the appropriate people. Decisions can be reversed, and missing pieces filled in.

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mecej4 · ‎09-26-2017

I see the text "overstrikes" on p.125, etc., and they should be fixed. In the meantime, you can make the garbled text clear by simply selecting and copying the whole line in the PDF page, and then pasting the clipboard in an editor or at the command line.

j0e · ‎11-05-2017

I also encourage Intel to bring back the context sensitive F1 help for 2018 in VS. It's removal is certainly a step backwards. 99% of the time I just use help to refresh my memory regarding a function, etc that has been in Fortran for years, but I haven't used in a while. It would be fine if the local, off-line, context sensitive documentation might not include that latest editions/modifications. Having a PDF copy is not the same.

dboggs · ‎11-05-2017

I do like VS as an editor and their whole IDS, but it seems like it has been a constant source of upgrade trouble over the years, and it's getting worse. I remember when we complained (loudly in fact) when Microsoft decided to remove the support for color printing of our source codes. That was a real nuisance but nothing compared to this!

It brings up the questions: (1) why is it necessary for Intel to package every new release of Fortran with the latest (greatest NOT) version of VS? Is there some kind of political trouble in keeping with the same old VS for a long (, long, long) time? (2) Can there not be an option for Fortran users to just use an old version of VS--one they are familiar with and actually works well--even if the Fortran comes packaged with a later version? E.g. at installation time: "a compatible but older version of VS (ver. ?.?) has been detected on your system - press X to use that or Y to use the current VS (ver. ?.?). I'm sure there are support issues with Microsoft in using old versions, but they might be less trouble than with using new versions.

I'd press X in an instant.

Steve_Lionel · ‎11-06-2017

I'll offer my observations based on experience. Of course, I no longer "speak for Intel".

Intel Visual Fortran is quite unusual in supporting three or sometimes four recent VS releases. This in itself poses numerous issues for the Intel developers. It's not just maintaining multiple packages (as Microsoft introduces incompatibilities with each new version) but also it's complicated making it possible to link against the MSVC libraries from any of the supported versions.

Since there is an ongoing cost for each additional VS version supported, it's not practical to keep old VS versions supported forever, especially when Microsoft drops support for them. In general, Intel followed Microsoft's lead in when to drop support for a VS version.

As for the bundled VS environment, yes, many customers do complain when that version is perceived as "obsolete", and Microsoft stops supporting updates for the older VS shells, so there's a strong pressure to try to keep reasonably current for the VS Shell. Counteracting that is the cost (both in development and business arrangements) to switch to a newer shell, but I've seen the gripes when the shell version lags so I think Intel is striking the right balance here.

I don't pretend to know what is behind the loss of F1 help, (my earlier supposition has been denied), and hope it can be restored. I don't think it's directly related to VS version changes.

David_Vowles · ‎02-05-2018

Thank you Andrew.

Actually, I had reviewed the post to which you refer prior to writing my post yesterday. The earlier post refers to (i) version 18, not 17, (ii) integration of help documentation with the MSVS IDE; and (iii) linkage of the F1 button to the help system. None of these things are of interest to me. My interest is in the offline *.html, searchable, resizable help that I had viewed routinely using my trusty firefox browser, quite independently of any IDE. (I note that Intel provide a PDF copy of the documentation for download. This, for my purposes is inferior to the browser based documentation).

I note that the post to which Andrew refers was originally made on 19 September 2017. One commentator stated in the thread on 21 September that they had reported the documentation issue to Intel during beta testing in April [2017] -- Intel ticket number 02752845. This feedback apparently had no effect. The final comment by an Intel person was made on 25 September. Among other things it was stated that:

"Regarding the request to bring the F1 feature back: Please be assured that we have heard all of you. Your feedback is very important to us. This request was escalated to the proper department for consideration."

I would be most grateful if Intel could point to an information release about their plans to resolve the issue. Otherwise, since some four months have now passed since the request was "escalated to the proper department" it would be most helpful if Intel could advise their customers if and when they plan to resolve the issue of offline documentation. Or, at the very least, advise when they intend to provide such advice.

Can Intel also confirm that restoration of the F1 help facility means that offline *.html help files will be included in the installation as had been the case up until at least version 17.4.

As I noted in my original post the C++ component of the Intel Parallel Studio offering has seen fit to retain offline help (at least until version 17.6). It seems passing strange that two arms of this product offering would make very different decisions about such an important matter as the distribution of documentation. Whilst I do not doubt the difficulty in maintaining MS integrations across multiple versions it begs the question why the C++ development group can do so but the Fortran group cannot.

Many thanks,
David.

Devorah_H_Intel · ‎04-20-2018

F1 Help feature is now available for testing in Parallel Studio XE 2019 Beta

Please refer to this article for more information:

https://software.intel.com/en-us/articles/download-documentation-intel-compiler-current-and-previous