RE: Levels of detail -- are we beyond this? (take II)

["Combs, Richard" <richard -dot- combs -at- Polycom -dot- com>]

Evelyn Lee Barney wrote:

> Aww now Geoff - i wasn't gonna name names - but YES - darn it all.
they
> are the worst offenders of this kind  I'm familiar with.
> 
> Ev
> 
> Geoff Hart wrote:
> >
> >
> > Did anyone say "Adobe"? <g> I'm hardly what you'd call naive about
> > computers, and I use some parts of Creative Suite heavily and other
> > parts erratically, but I often run into precisely this kind of
> > instruction, and have to dig deeper into the online help (sometimes
a
> > really deep dig) to find out just what the heck they're talking
about,
> > by which time I've half-forgotten the original question that sent me
> > to the documentation.

Absolutely. For years, many of us (myself included) have derided
"Microsoft-type help": "In the X field, type an X. From the Y list,
select a Y. ..." But at least they tell you where to find everything. 

Adobe seems to have adopted an "enumerate the capabilities" style: "You
can do A to your widget. You can customize it by doing B. Or you can
supersize it by applying C." No clue as to where one might find A, B, or
C. No links to them in the help. And at least one of the three isn't in
the index. 

And for the next upgrade, they'll reshuffle the menus again, so you have
to hunt around even for the familiar functions. 

Oh, yeah, and the install probably won't work. 

<grumble-grumble />

Richard


Richard G. Combs
Senior Technical Writer
Polycom, Inc.
richardDOTcombs AT polycomDOTcom
303-223-5111
------
rgcombs AT gmailDOTcom
303-777-0436
------





 
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