So, what is the troubleshooter? Well, think of this as a way to find answers to questions. If you have a topic in mind (and if we have the answer), then you will be able to click further and further into the data until you get to the specific question you have.

You can think of it as a knowledgebase, except that every article has some correlation to another article. The hierarchy created allows you to “drill down” within some subject matter to get the information you want. This reduces keyword searching, while keeping it all neatly organized. You will find there is a parent/child relationship between articles that is presented to you in a question and answer format. Each article can have one question, with child articles being displayed as possible answers. As you read through one question and select the answer that best applies to you, that will take you to the next article, with its own question and answers.

When created, each article is given article ID number. The new article is also assigned a parent ID number, which references the article ID of its parent article. If necessary, an article can be reassigned to a different parent article. Due to the database design used, any article can have an unlimited number of child articles. In addition, there is no “folder depth” limit on how deep articles can go. The database structure is extremely simple, and we all know that simple is good.

If you still aren't clear on how it works, think of it this way. When you were a child, did you ever read one of those "dynamic" books where you read a bit, answer a question, and then jump to a different part of the book where the story continues again. There are multiple outcomes to the story since you get to choose which way to go with it. The troubleshooter is similar in concept

You could also think of it like a family tree that started years ago. The root of the tree is your ancestors, and they had children, who then had more children and so on. Each article in this database, like each person, has to have some article that it comes from. Humans have two parents, however, the articles in this database each have only one parent. They can have an unlimited number of child articles though.

If you're still confused, just check it out. Hopefully a little use will make it clearer.

For you database people, here is the schema of this database: