Re: User and user guides

["Edgar D' Souza" <edgar -dot- b -dot- dsouza -at- gmail -dot- com>]

Sighh.. you just *have* to be an uneasy soul... and I think I know why.

Answers:

1A. Lost. No, not the TV series.
1B. Hopeful. Hoping that the "user manual" actually describes how to
perform a task, instead of moronically describing the fields in each
form/screen.
1C. If it's a manual you've written, then the answer is "doomed."

2. No, but you can write a guide for 99.5 users of a software. The .5
is obviously a very uneasy soul, but that's an occupational hazard.

3. As much wood as a woodchuck could, if a woodchuck could and would
chuck wood. Or, to paraphrase, as much technical as a user guide could
be, if a user guide could and would be technical.

Cheers (oh - you mean it isn't Friday yet? This was eerily akin to a
Friday post.. but I haven't put out a flame for a long while, so
please cut the disgruntled some slack.)
Ed.

-- 
Edgar D'Souza (http://edgar.b.dsouza.googlepages.com/)
à_à my GIMP-Python "Tear-off" plugin at: http://registry.gimp.org/node/10977


On Wed, Aug 19, 2009 at 7:58 PM, Raj<uneasysoul -at- rediffmail -dot- com> wrote:
> I have three queries:
>
> What exactly is a user looking in a user manual?
>
> Can a user guide be written for all users of a software?
>
> How much technical can a user guide be?
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Free Software Documentation Project Web Cast: Covers developing Table of
Contents, Context IDs, and Index, as well as Doc-To-Help  
2009 tips, tricks, and best practices.
http://www.doctohelp.com/SuperPages/Webcasts/

Help & Manual 5: The complete help authoring tool for individual
authors and teams. Professional power, intuitive interface. Write
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