TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
Hello,
I posted this question to the list a couple weeks ago and received only two
responses -- maybe because I posted it on a Friday afternoon. So I figured
I'd try again.
I'd like to make sure we're using the correct term to refer to a feature in
our interface.
Our applications have lots of "hover help," wherein holding your cursor over
something causes a line of text to appear in a rectangular box, explaining
that item. This help text disappears within about 3 seconds.
The previous writer of the docs I'm working on referred to it as "fly-over
hints." I've heard others casually refer to it as "hover help." I've also
heard this term: "Help hints." What is the proper term?
It can't be ToolTips, because it doesn't just describe toolbar buttons.
"ScreenTips"
was suggested by the MS manual of style. Using the word "screen" kind of
bothers
me, though, because that word went out with DOS (unless, of course, you're
referring to the monitor's entire screen). MS says you shouldn't say
"hover."
Thanks in advance,
Beth Kane, Tucson
bethkane -at- tcisolutions -dot- com
