Electronic documentation systems that include hypertext links for navigation purposes are well known. For example, an Internet page is typically provided with hyperlinks for navigation within a page and between other pages. Often, a hyperlink is displayed as a word or group of words that are offset from other words in the document by virtue of a difference in color. Additionally a special icon or picture can be associated with a word of group of words to set as a hyperlink. The ways to display a hyperlink are well known. Clicking on a hyperlink on a web page can jump to a different section on the web page or can open another Internet page. Other types of hyperlinks can be associated with files such as a sound file or a video file. Selecting a hyperlink can open the file allowing for a sound file to be heard or a video file to be viewed.
Therefore, a hyperlink in an Internet page or electronic document written in a mark-up language such as the well-known hypertext markup language (HTML) allows for navigation between and within pages of a document and can open files associated with the link. Commercially available programs like Folio Views sold by Next page of Lehi, Utah provide much more sophisticated capabilities. In such a program, text documents can be provided with different types of hyperlinks, such as jump links, program links, query links, and script links. Jump links allow jumping to a predefined location in the same or in a different document. Query links display those parts of a document that comply with a query selection criteria. A program link can open any kind of document using its associated program. Script links can be used to trigger dedicated modules in a viewer program. To use these types of links, documents have to be prepared beforehand with the relevant link information like jump destinations, the selection criteria, and necessary labels pre-embedded. For an IEED system, the preparation of the documents and the creation of hyperlinks are a labor-intensive process. This is not as large a problem for the embodiment where the documentation is built once and stays the same for many users over a long period of time. However, it becomes very costly to create and maintain a documentation system when a large number of variations are included and material changes frequently.
Unfortunately, the latter is the case in industries such as the semiconductor industry where expensive and complex capital equipment is used for the production of the semiconductor devices. The different pieces of equipment as used by different customers are normally not identical, since they contain either special production related parts particular to specific customers, or have to comply with customer requirements. Therefore, different IEED packages must be created for each customer. Since there is a definitive need for IEED systems, containing all the customer specific variations, it is necessary to use automated techniques to minimize the cost of creation of an IEED package.