About BBHelp

Keywords: about; bbhelp

For who:

BBHelp is designed for people already familiar with some molecular biology techniques. It makes information on protocols, recipes, plasmid maps, etcetera, accessible in a quick, concise and pertinent manner.

Why:

Windows help provides a convenient way to view, list and centralize methods and recipes inside a lab. It allows graphical images, printing as well as clipboard pasting (to incorporate the information directly into your own documents).

How to use:

Click here to see how to use BBHelp.

Authors:

BBHelp is being maintaining and updated by Brendan. Incorporated into BBHelp, is the U.C.T. Medical microbiology honours techniques course manual of Harold Zappe, and the U.C.T. Microbiology techniques manual of Vernon Coyne, Ed Rybicki, Shez Reid and Di James. Thanks to Lafras Steyn for supporting the generation of BBHelp. See contributing authors for a complete list of contributors.

Printed manuals:

Please contact the contributing authors directly to purchase/obtain printed manuals.

Copyright:

If you acknowledge the use of BBHelp and, where appropriate, the contributing author, you are free to copy, print and use the information from this document.

How to contribute

Keywords: contribute; suggestions; additions; errata

We welcome all criticisms, suggestions and submissions. We especially welcome positive feedback. If you like the idea of BBHelp tell us and we will endevour to keep it up to date.

Please email documents to BBABB@medmicro.uct.ac.za, as attachments to email messages. The documents can be in text, wordperfect or MS-word format. I would prefer documents in Word-for-windows format. Please use arial font point size 10. To enter a micro (m) sign, or any other greek letters, use symbol font (eg m for m). For a degree (§), type alt-0186 on the number pad. Sub-script and super~ do not work

To submit a protocol:

The document should (ideally) contain, on separate pages, a description, a long protocol, a short protocol and some information about yourself, as well as recipes for solutions that are particular to your protocol and a list of related protocols.

To submit a recipe:

The document must contain information on how to make the solution, the list of ingredients, their final concentration, storage conditions and any special care that must be taken. Please include a table with the amount of ingrediants to add for a useful final volume/amount. eg

Component 	stock conc	final conc.	/ 10 ml	/100ml

To submit appendices and graphical images:

Only graphical images that can be included in word-for-windows files can be used. If possible, please incorporate the images directly into your document. Formats understood, include pcx, bmp, cgm, tif and hgl files. Please submit a list of approiate keywords for the appendix. Otherwise it is relatively free-form.

Formatting

Disclaimer

Keywords: disclaimer

You use BBHelp at your own risk. We accept no responsibility for any information included in BBHelp or for anyone using BBHelp. You do so completely at your own risk.

This is intended as an informal guide. If any institution or person's rights have been infringed by BBHelp, it is completely accidental, in which case, please inform us and we will try to rectify the problem.

Format used in BBHelp

Keywords: Format

avoid special character formating, such as sub-superscript, and keep to arial/symboll font. avoid footnotes/headers etc and definitely avoid special paragraph formatting like kkep-with-next. Paragraphs can be boxed, but tables cannot have grids.

here are the available graphical images

represents protocols

represents a description of a protocol

represents an entry in an appendix

represents a contributing author

press this to exit BBHelp

press this to go back to the master contents page

represents a recipe

represents a harmful substance

represents a substance that should be treated with care

represents a harmless substance, or little caution needed

this is the logo

alternative index entry

alternative protocol entry

up arrow - for alternative methods on same entry

alternative recipe entry

How to use BBHelp

Keywords: use; help

To use BBHelp simply use the standard windows help features.

How to navigate:

1. Two windows appear when you start, the one on the left contains the contents lists and the one on the right contains the data.

2. Click on green underlined topics in the contents page to jump to a new topic (usually in the information window).

3. Click on dotted green unlined text to bring a pop-up window. These windows usually contain related topics, for quick navigation to similar topics.

4. Browse buttons (<< and >>) can be used to page through related information.

5. To do a keyword search, click on the search button and type the word of interest, etc.

6. To move back to a previous topic, click on the back button.

7. To move back to a higher menu in the contents window, click on button.

8. To exit BBHelp, click on the button.

How to print a topic:

1. Remember to setup your printer. You can use the menu item File | Print setup to do this.

2. Make sure the topic you want to print is in the data window.

3. either

b. Pick the menu item File | Print Topic

How to copy a topic to the clipboard:

Please note that graphics and text formatting are not copied - only text is. To copy graphics, one can press Alt-PrintScreen.

1. make sure the topic you want to copy to the clipboard is in the data window.

2. either

b. press Ctrl-Ins, or

c. choose the menu item Edit | Copy.