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Subject:Re: what to use as sample text From:Karen Gwynn/Datatel <Karen_Gwynn -at- DATATEL -dot- COM> Date:Fri, 15 Mar 1996 08:39:38 EDT
our screen samples use to be generated from our development tool and each field
would show what is called "sequence letters:" the first field that was filled
in -- either by the system or the user -- was "a," the next "b," etc. The
length of the field was represented by the number of letters. Thus, if a field
was five character long, it might be represented as "eeeee". Our users hated
it. It didn't give them any concept of what a completed screen was suppose to
look like.
We started using "sample data" several years ago and it has gotten a much
better response. As long as the samples are realistic (a field representing
income of a college student, for example, should show something like $2,000,
not $200,000 or $2) they have no problem with it. Now of course, our screens
are in paper doc and when the text references the screen, it is clear that this
is an example. Also, in the text, we are clear about making the distinction
between examples of codes that they will define at their site ("Example
academic levels include UG for undergraduate and GR for graduate") versus codes
that they cannot change and must use the ones provided ("Valid blah codes are A
for accepted and D for denied").
