Re: techwr-l digest: April 08, 2002

["Jan C. Wright" <jancw -at- wrightinformation -dot- com>]

I spend two hours every week explaining computers to elderly folks at the 
local library. They sign up for one hour sessions, on anything from word 
processing to the internet to whatever. They have usually inherited a 
computer from their children, and it already has tons of stuff installed on 
it. I've found there are major humps for them to get through in 
conceptually understanding Windows, and I suspect most new users have to 
face these humps as well.

Figuring out which part of the bifocals to look through. Heck, that's a 
problem for me as well!

Cut, Copy and Paste is a big one. Once they have figured that out, they are 
thrilled to copy things and paste them.

Typing at an insertion point -- figuring out where that insertion point is, 
and clicking to get one is a major event. And it is a dexterity issue.

When to click and when to double-click is a big one -- the Web and its 
inconsistencies drive folks nuts when they are new to it. There's also a 
dexterity issue in double-clicking, and just getting the pointer over 
something to click it. Which part of the pointer, and just getting it there 
when you have arthritis is major.

Highlighting anything to do something to it -- with dexterity problems, 
highlighting with a mouse is a nasty business. Word's tendency to just 
scream the window down when you are highlighting is horrible! We do a lot 
of keyboard shortcuts, but then there is a memory problem -- you have to 
remember what to do.

Saving and save as -- understanding save as means you are almost an expert.

Where your files are is the worst hump -- I train people to keep everything 
in My Documents, which I personally don't do, but I figure it is the 
consistent folder on everyone's machines. No one understands the desktop 
metaphor at this point -- things have gotten too fuzzy and rearranged for 
that metaphor to work at first hearing. So we go over the find dialog box a 
lot too. I spend a lot of time with file drawer metaphors, talking about 
being a mouse inside a folder inside an accordion folder, and popping up 
and looking around, and then realizing I have to go up even more to see 
where I am in the drawer. That seems to work. I also use clothes-washer 
metaphors, and the amount of laundry to be done to explain the differences 
between hard drives and memory.

As for books, manuals, online help, that actually doesn't work until later 
in the process for some folks. I have heard comments like "Oh, I looked at 
that help thing, but it didn't seem very helpful." Folks have to learn to 
use help, and until they have mastered windows, moving things around, 
clicking, selecting, etc., they are so scared they have broken something 
that they don't really read-for-comprehension in anything that just pops 
up. They can cope with searching for something in help only after they are 
comfortable with opening and closing windows, opening and closing 
applications, typing at the insertion point, etc.

It's an eye-opener. I had one guy who was very anal-retentive, and he was 
so worried about not having enough space on his hard drive that he kept 
opening up folders and deleting everything in them that didn't make sense 
to him. He had a field day in the program files and Windows folders, killed 
the machine several times, had to be talked through reinstallling Windows 
by tech support each time, and I had to keep mentioning gently to him that 
it was not a good idea to throw things out until we were sure they weren't 
important, that he had plenty of space. It took him a while to believe....

jan

------------------------------------------------------
Wright Information Indexing Services
Jancw -at- wrightinformation -dot- com
www.wrightinformation.com
------------------------------------------------------



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