Re: Task Analysis

[sheldon kohn <sheldon -dot- kohn -at- MCI -dot- COM>]

If you are looking for a great book, I cannot agree with the recommendation
of Hackos and Redish's text. I read Hackos "Managing Your Documentation
Projects" and thought it was moderately useful, though superficial. Next, I
bought the "User and Task Analysis for Interface Design." I expected much
more. The authors seemed very much impressed with themselves, and I did not
find a lot of useful information. There is a moderately helpful checklist at
the end of the text, but unless you plan to visit grocery stores, the text
is not that useful.

It is interesting that Hackos has managed to become some sort of technical
writing guru. I have long been puzzled by the fact that in a field of
writers, no one has taken time to produce a text that does not rely on
superficial analysis and anecdotal examples. In graduate school, one of my
best professors argued that the way to gain credibility is to write on
topics everyone else ignores.

If you want a great book on task analysis, you will have to look in the
engineering literature.

Regards,

Sheldon Kohn
Technical Writing Consultant


-----Original Message-----
From: Technical Writers List; for all Technical Communication issues
[mailto:TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU]On Behalf Of E. Gail Miedema
Sent: Tuesday, January 05, 1999 8:15 PM
To: TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU
Subject: Re: Task Analysis


On Tue, 5 Jan 1999, Thomas Quine wrote:

> Can anyone recommend a great book on task analysis?
>
> Has anyone used task analysis as a basis for documentation? How did you
> do it?


See JoAnn Hackos and Janice Redish's book "User and Task Analysis for
Interface Design" published in 1998 by Wiley.

See the link  http://www2.ari.net/redish/h&r.htm


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