RE: Mac vs PC users

["Sarah Stegall" <sstegall -at- bivio -dot- net>]

Deborah:

I'm a die-hard, dyed-in-the-wool, Mac fanatic. I have seven of them at
home or at college with my kids. My husband jokes that he'll have to
bury one of them with me. But even so, I would not agree with the
feedback you are getting, that any function is "intuitive". There's no
such animal. Anything as complicated as a computer requires SOME
introduction, SOME explanation. Yes, I believe that Macs have a better
user interface design, but I would never expect a new user of ANY
software to automatically know every action. If you know your audience
consists ONLY of dedicated Macolytes like me, then maybe you can skip
one or two procedures, but unless you have that iron-clad guarantee from
your marketing people, I would say you should assume your users are not
accustomed to the Mac interface or its conventions.

However, the advice I've been seeing here about not documenting EVERY
means of achieving something is valid. If you're dealing with newbies, I
would give them ONE way to do something. Put the shortcuts in an
appendix "For Advanced Users" and a note in the introduction about where
to find it. Your users familiar with Macs will be satisfied, and the
newbies won't be intimidated.

Sarah
Uses Windows XP at work



On 2010-07-06, at 10:03 AM, Deborah Hemstreet wrote:

> Hi all,
> 
> Are there any studies out there that anyone knows of that compare how
MAC users interact with computers compared to PC users?
> 
> Are MAC users quicker learners?
> 
> I"m writing some Help for a MAC application, and a lot of the feedback
I get is, EVERYONE knows this - you don't have to explain it (such as
what happens when I click File > Save, or what an Action button is, etc.
> 
> Your thoughts would be appreciated.
> 
> Deborah
> 


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