Online Help Usability

["BOB, ZKO3-4/CUBE 4X49" <pezzini -at- JARETH -dot- ENET -dot- DEC -dot- COM>]

  Caryn Rizell writes:

  >My coworkers and I have been wondering if the word 'help' is
  >still a appropriate name to use for online information.  We
  >are finding that some customers never even go to the Help menu
  >item at all!

  >Our online help consists of a graphical guided tour and concepts section,
  ********************************************************************

  Our manuals in the OpenVMS docset are written in a single source
  file (SDML) coded to handle three medias:

    PostScript - hardcopy manuals
    Bookreader - complete manuals read "online" in a windows environment
                 [like Interleaf's Worldview]
    Help       - online help that provides context-sensitive help
                 [snippets of the manual on a help screen]

  So, two medias provide online information: one is online help
  providing information focussed on the task from which HELP was called
  and another that really is a bookreader for reading whole manuals.

  Here, the term "online" by its self is inadaquate in defining what type
  of online information you are providing.

  What we have here is:

               - Online book reading
               - Online context-sensitive Help

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