Re: need advice - writing wiki Help for web app

[Deborah Hemstreet <dvora -at- tech-challenged -dot- com>]

I'm working on a Help project for a Mac. The SW is quite intuitive to 
USE - once you become familiar with it. But there are tons of wonderful 
features for the users that are simply not intuitive to FIND. Once 
found, they are easy. (I'd love to have more say with the programmers on 
that, but that is another issue.)

I've worked very hard to analyze the content and to be cautious about 
overuse of graphics. I place them where something may not be initially 
intuitive, and am using them as drop-down graphics, so that beginners 
can see the picture with the text, but experienced users can get to the 
meat of what they are looking for.

We are not using and videos, nor Flash, since the Help is targeted for 
Safari on a Mac, and apparently Flash and Mac are not the best of friends.

I'm in the final stages of preparing the Help and my client posted it on 
their secure site for their Beta testers. I'm quite excited because I 
made sure the testers were asked if they felt there were too many or too 
few pictures. All of them preferred the Webhelp to Apple Help, all said 
the graphics were appropriate and non-intrusive, and several said that 
they had already learned things they didn't know.

I share this, not to give myself a pat on the back, but to say that 
there is no easy answer for the use of screen shots or multi-media in 
your Help project. To make the right decisions you need to do the following:

1. Know who your end users are, and find a way to meet the needs of 
users at the lowest and highest levels without them feeling like you are 
talking down (or up) to them.
2. Have a client who WANTS to be involved in this process and is willing 
to provide as much information as possible. (I was fortunate to have 
that kind of client).
3. When a feature is simply poorly named, or implemented, be able to 
tactfully run it by your client and give them the pros and cons for 
change, AND suggest the change you are thinking of. My client was quite 
receptive and accepted, I guess 90% of my proposed changes.
4. In this case, I was also updating legacy documentation. Find out the 
rationale behind the legacy documentation, style, and use of graphics 
BEFORE making drastic changes. The information I gleaned from my client 
made it possible to delete half of the graphics used in the past, and 
necessitated updating most of the others.
5. Find out the anticipated way the Help will be used. And get as much 
information as you can. Nearly all the users for this Help will be Mac 
on Safari, but some will be using a MAC Emulator on PC (which has its 
own set of issues). Most of my clients users do not use IE.
6. Think about every graphic that is being placed in the Help. How does 
it contribute to the topic? Does the text repeat what the graphic says 
more clearly? Can you edit the graphic in order to call out the 
important information?

I know that everything I've shared here is really very basic, DUH 
information. But I've found that consciously thinking about these things 
as I write help tremendously in limiting the number of graphics, and 
making sure they are applicable to the topic when they are included.

I also have to admit that this was an unusually cooperative client who 
knew what she wanted from the outset. So I have a lot to be thankful for.

I hope these thoughts are helpful.

Deborah
http://www.tech-challenged.com
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