Want your documentation user-tested ?

[Jim Stratman <jstratma -at- CARBON -dot- CUDENVER -dot- EDU>]

Dear TECHWHIRLERS:

Again in late January, 1999, the M.S. in Technical Communication Program at
the University of Colorado at Denver will offer a course in Usability
Testing (at the graduate level).  This past fall we provided valuable
usability testing for diverse clients, including (among others) TargetSmart,
Inc. (specializing in marketing software), for the National Renewable Energy
Laboratories (NREL) Website, and for J.D. Edwards Company, specializing in
accounting software.  One of the areas we emphasize in our M.S. curriculum,
and that we particularly focus in this course, is the testing and
improvement of a broad range of online and hard copy documentation and
instructional material, including (but not limited to) such things as:

--software documentation (including interfaces & help systems), tutorials &
instructions

--documentation for consumer electronics, appliances (VCRs, stereos, voice
messaging answering   machines, etc.)

--health hazard/risk disclosures and documentation, such as:
  *warnings on (or inside of) packaging
  *patient package inserts for pharmaceuticals and home care health products
(e.g., syringe kits)
  *proper usage instructions for household appliances, tools, etc.

--government & consumer legal documentation, such as:
  *tax documentation
  *real estate documentation/forms
  *securities prospecti
  *banking/loan transactions
  *insurance policies/forms

Here's the pitch: For the Spring 1999 course, we are again inviting both
public and private sector organizations to participate. We invite such
organizations to provide actual documents/software for which they would like
user-testing and related comprehensibility evaluations to be performed in
our labs.  While we would not charge organizations for the tests and
evaluations/reports themselves, we may require some monetary support for
securing and paying user-test participants and for transcribing audio and/or
video data.  Note that we are interested both in consumer-type documents as
well as documents for more specialized audiences/technicians. We are equally
interested in online and traditional hard-copy documents, and in
electro-mechanical as well as computer technology documentation.

If you or your organization think you might be interested in supplying such
documents to our Program--in exchange for obtaining the written results of a
highly competent user-test evaluation--please contact me right away.

Be sure to reply to my personal email (below), not to this list.

Sincerely,

Professor James F. Stratman, Director
Technical Communication Program
University of Colorado at Denver
Plaza Building, Suite 102-B
Campus Box 176
Denver, Colorado 80217-3364

PERSONAL EMAIL: jstratma -at- carbon -dot- cudenver -dot- edu

Phone: (303) 556-2884
http://www.cudenver.edu/public/techcomm


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