Re: Typographical treatment of GUI components

["Janice Gelb" <janice -dot- gelb -at- sun -dot- com>]

"Michael West" <mbwest -at- removebigpond -dot- net -dot- au
>> "anice wrote:
> 
> > ... asone of the authors, I
> > can explain the reasoning behind this decision, as it
> > is our in-house style as well.
> 
> Was the "reasoning" based on field testing,
> or prejudice and opinion?
> 

All three :->

> 
> But typically a user is reading only *one*
> procedure, not a bunch of them -- so the
> bold terms in that one procedure *do* stand
> out against other words in the procedure.
> Especially since it is the individual procedural
> *step*  that is the working unit -- not the
> whole page. This is particularly true in online
> help.
> 

If most of the items in the procedure are steps 
and most of those steps contain multiple menu items 
and menu names, then the point stands: there is so 
much bold that any particular bold item doesn't 
really stand out.
 
> 
> > Finally, the bolding
> > often means that users will skip over often important
> > explanatory text and just pick out the bold items.
> 
> That ability to scan for the key items is
> precisely what I like about the intelligent
> use of boldface. I do not want "explanatory
> text" mixed up in procedures anyway. I want
> any important general information first, and
> *then* the procedure.
> 

I completely agree that large amounts of explanatory 
text do not belong in a procedure. As a matter of fact, 
we insist that writers only put the instructions in the 
actual step, and that any necessary brief explanatory 
text (such as "Do not capitalize the filename" and the 
like) are on a line underneath. That is the type of 
text that users can easily skip if we are encouraging 
them to skip from bold item to bold item.

-- Janice

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