Office 2016 Help is online only?

[Paul_Hossler]

I have a subscription to Office 2016 and it appears that

1. the app help is online only (used to be an option)

2. F1 on a keyword or Excel function doesn't work in a context-sensitive way any more

Is there a setting or download to change the behavior so that Help comes from my PC and not the MS servers?

[markecb]

I think that this option is not available (yet)...

[SamT]

If you can find an older version that had context help, you can copy the *.chm files to your HD and create a shortcut to them. You still won't have Context help, (the F1 key won't work,) but you would have Helps on your PC.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=40326 has these files for download

Access 2013 Developer Documentation.chm
Excel 2013 Developer Documentation.chm
Office Shared 2013 Developer Documentation.chm
OneNote 2013 Developer Documentation.chm

Outlook 2013 Developer Documentation.chm
PowerPoint 2013 Developer Documentation.chm

Publisher 2013 Developer Documentation.chm

Visio 2013 Developer Documentation.chm

Word 2013 Developer Documentation.chm

Office Shared has the VBA help in it.











Download them to one folder, then in Windows Explorer, select that folder and "Send To" Desktop (Create Shortcut). You can then move that shortcut to anywhere on the Start Menu and all the files will have links to them in that "Folder" Shortcut.

You can probably write code to trap the F1 keypress that would open that "Folder" shortcut.

[Paul_Hossler]

@SamT - thanks

While not an ideal solution (actually it seems like a step backward) it does make the help more accessible