Re: What's This?" help

Subject: Re: What's This?" help
From: Mark Wilden <Mark -at- MWILDEN -dot- COM>
Date: Mon, 29 Sep 1997 13:23:55 -0700

> Mike Huber - mike -dot- huber -at- software -dot- rockwell -dot- com asked:
>
> >Is there any research available on whether field-level "What's This?"
> >help is, well, helpful?

This is just a personal perspective, but like a lot of things, it's good if
done right and useless otherwise.

There are times when it can improve the interface, however. For example,
I'm working on a program that includes a listbox, one of whose columns
shows the most recently used order. I can label this column MRU and know
that anyone who doesn't know what that abbreviation means can use What's
This to find out. Otherwise, I'd be at a loss to know what to label it
without making the column ridiculously wide.

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