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DESCRIPTION
xCHM is an open source (GPL) viewer for reading Microsoft's proprietary .CHM (compiled HTML) files. These .chm files are commonly used as product manuals, and lots of e-books come in this format. For instance, the PHP manuals and the Java class library references are primarily available in .chm format.

Previously, there was no way that I could find to read these on OS X, without using a utility that would decompress the HTML into a million tiny files. This program was originally written for Linux, but because it was written using the wxWindows (www.wxwindows.org) GUI Toolkit, it was fairly easy to compile it to run as a native Mac application. Even though this was originally Unix software, X11 IS NOT REQUIRED.

All I did was tweak the source a little to get it to be a little more Mac-friendly, and create a double-clickable application bundle.

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WHAT'S NEW
Version 1.17: Minor fix: xCHM is now compilable with GCC 4.4. Users compiling with a GCC version prior to 4.4 or binary users should be totally unaffected by this.
REQUIREMENTS
Mac OS X 10.4 or later.

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SCREENSHOT

Developer:Razvan Cojocaru
Downloads:48,051
  - Version d/l:4,359
Development:HTML
License:Free
Date:26 May 2009
Platform:PPC/Intel
RATING
****½
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xCHM User Reviews (26 posts)Write A Review
sort: smiles | time
Apr 21 2009

MACSOLU  Version 1.13 is the FINAL version that has been distributed as a Mac .app -- this version (1.15) is uncompiled and will be of NO USE to the vast majority of Mac users. Don't be confused when your download of 1.15 results in a folder full of misc. files.  
(Version 1.15)

praisebury
+3
[ 1 Reply - Reply ]
Replies:
Aug 14 2009

ISCREEN  Thanks for the info!  
(Version 1.17)

praisebury
0

Jul 30 2008
***..

TEKL  I tried several CHM Viewers for OS X. iChm, xCHM and ArCHMock are the only one which I can recommend.

But all are not perfect yet.

ArCHMock 1.1:

+ Fast

+ Nice Interface

+ Good HTML rendering (Webkit)

+ Highlighting search results in Text

+ Good keyboard support (Cmd+G etc.)

+ Bookmarks

+ Automatically locates the current page in the table of contents

+ Good search results (can be sorted by relevance)

+ Zooming can be resetted

+ Remembers the last position

+ Open source

- No Index

- No options for searching

- No "find in page"

- No toolbar button for print (but Cmd+P works)

- No tabs or multiple document windows

iChm 0.9.1:

+ Fast

+ Nice Interface

+ Good HTML rendering (Webkit)

+ Tabs

+ Auto-update feature

- No Index

- Bad keyboard support (no Cmd+G)

- No options for searching

- You habe to manually 'locate' the current page in the table of contents

- Only searchs for words (no partial search)

- No home button (and no hotkey for that)

- Because of the small tabs its hard to get the title of the current page (which is not shown in the window title)

xCHM 1.13:

+ Contents/Index/Results on left side

+ Searchable index

+ Options for searching in titles only or partial

+ Automatically locates the current page in the table of contents

+ Bookmarks

+ Open source

- Ugly interface

- Bad HTML rendering

- Does not support custom context menus (like in SelfHTML)

- Slow (scrolling)

- Search results are always sorted alphabetically

- No tabs or multiple document windows

- The binary of the Mac version won't be updated anymore

At the moment ArCHMock has the best usability for me.  
(Version 1.13)

praisebury
+4
[ 1 Reply - Reply ]
Replies:
Nov 16 2008

MISTERE  Excellent! Thank you for taking the time to post these reviews!  
(Version 1.13)

praisebury
0

May 2 2008

THEWHITERABBIT  Unfortunately, I no longer have access to the MacMini machine I've been connecting to build xCHM. If you need pre-compiled xCHM binaries that you can drag-and-drop to install, I will continue to create them free of charge, provided that I manage to raise enough money to buy a cheap Mac machine to work on. If you would like to donate, you can use the "Support this project button" at the bottom of any page from http://xchm.sourceforge.net. All you need is a SourceForge.net account (which is free), and a PayPal account. The minimum donation allowed by the SourceForge.net system is $5, and I need to raise about 800 EUROs for the cheapest MacMini machine available here.

This is, of course, if you prefer to have pre-built universal binaries. The source code is still available for free, and it is obviously possible to make Mac builds.  
(Version 1.13)

praisebury
0
[ 2 Replies - Reply ]
Replies:
Aug 27 2008

SYED ALI  800 Euros for the cheapest Mac Mini? Wow .. that's expensive. In USA the cheapest Mac costs around $599.. and you can get it cheaper if you buy a refurbished.. but they are hard to come by. You should make a contact in USA who can help you in getting a Mac mini here. :)  
(Version 1.13)

praisebury
+1
Feb 9 2009

THEWHITERABBIT  You're right, it is expensive. Ordering from the US, though, would add shipping costs to Romania, plus ~20% extra in customs tax, so it would end up costing about the same ammount, if not more.  
(Version 1.13)

praisebury
+1

Nov 2 2007

RAIMONDI  It worked fine the first time I use it, after that I only get the splash window and can't open anything else. Any idea? it seems to be the best (unique)alternative to read CHM files...  
(Version 1.13)

praisebury
0
[ Reply ]
Aug 24 2006

BURRO  Worked beautifully in earlier versions. Arghh! I threw them away on two machines before trying 1.9... which does not work at all, except to open its own splash page.

I've tried it out on a 1.33MhZ G4 iBook, a brand-new Intel iBook, and 2 G4 733MHz towers. Same on each.

Thanks for your continued efforts, Rabbit!  
(Version 1.9)

praisebury
0
[ Reply ]
Jun 13 2006

THEWHITERABBIT  I've made a new build with the Unicode support disabled (my theory is that's what caused the crashes). Of course, I could be wrong. Please test it on i386 and let me know. You can get it from here:

http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/xchm/xchm-1.9a-universal.dmg?download  
(Version 1.9)

praisebury
0
[ 1 Reply - Reply ]
Replies:
Aug 6 2006

DBURNEY  It seems to run on my Intel iMac - thanks.  
(Version 1.9)

praisebury
0

Jun 12 2006

THEWHITERABBIT  I've built an universal binary of xCHM for version 1.9. Not sure if it works properly on i386 though, I could only test it on a PPC-based machine. Thought you might be interested in that. Cheers.  
(Version 1.8)

praisebury
0
[ 2 Replies - Reply ]
Replies:
Jun 12 2006

COLDFUSION1970  The application itself opened fine, but it kept quitting when i tried to open some of my chm files.

I tried it with 5 or 6 different chm files and it wouldnt open any of them.

I have a 20" Intel iMac with a 2ghz processor running 10.4.6.  
(Version 1.9)

praisebury
0
Jun 12 2006

BLUESPOT  xChm is quite unstable with every CHM file I tried to open. Either xChm crashes at startup, or reports that it couldn't read the CHM file.

Via Rosetta, it runs fine though it's rather slow (obviously...)

I've a MacBook with a 2ghz processor.  
(Version 1.9)

praisebury
0

Mar 24 2006

THEWHITERABBIT  Yeah the 1.3 version shown by get info is a slip-up (heh, sorry). Please update your links to the latest version (1.5-2) which is even friendlier for Mac OS X users (no more warnings if the locale is not set to default, toolbar buttons added for 'find in page' and 'copy selection', and now Cmd-C also works.  
(Version 1.5)

praisebury
0
[ Reply ]
Mar 22 2006

KOBALT  hmmm, the file that downloads when i click on the xCHM v1.5 link appears to be v1.3 (when checked with 'get info') ... what's up with that?  
(Version 1.5)

praisebury
0
[ Reply ]
Mar 22 2006

TEKL  Doesn't show images with SelfHTML 8.1.1, SelfHTML 8.0 works. HTML-Rendering is not perfect.  
(Version 1.5)

praisebury
0
[ Reply ]
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