HOW TOs?

Subject: HOW TOs?
From: "Hart, Geoff" <Geoff-H -at- MTL -dot- FERIC -dot- CA>
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com>
Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 09:28:31 -0500

Radwa Darwish is documenting General Ledger software <<I had in mind the
following: - Start with general features. - Go through the definitions and
tasks windows by giving a simple background and then a "How to..?" approach
to explain the usage of each field. - Add a reference part to list all
icons, buttons, glossary, error and warning messages and so forth. The thing
is that my boss, who is the software development manager, doesn't like the
"How to...?" approach and wants me to replace it with a listing of each
field, edit box or grid and a brief on its usage.>>

Your approach sounds basically sensible, assuming that by "How to" you mean
"How do I do the following tasks using this software?" Users want to know
how to do common tasks (e.g., balance a budget), and filling in fields only
represents the details of each step in those tasks. Think of it this way:
Nobody wants to fill in the interest rate field; everyone wants to
understand their cashf low via the ledger. So while adding field-level
reference information for fields etc. is useful, the task information is
more important. As is often the case in techwhirling, compromise is the way
to go: create both task-based information and reference information.

--Geoff Hart, FERIC, Pointe-Claire, Quebec
geoff-h -at- mtl -dot- feric -dot- ca
"User's advocate" online monthly at
www.raycomm.com/techwhirl/usersadvocate.html

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a
personality, and an obnoxious one at that."—Kim Roper

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