Describing field meanings and instructions

Subject: Describing field meanings and instructions
From: Lesli Ritchie <Lesli -dot- Ritchie -at- mediware -dot- com>
To: "techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>
Date: Thu, 22 Oct 2015 13:36:13 +0000

I always struggle with this one. Our software User Guides describe all the fields on a screen and give the user step-by-step instructions on how to do something, such as add a new record. I usually add a table that describes the fields and their options in the context of the steps, but I feel that this breaks the flow and could be confusing to a new user (our users have a wide skill range). How do you handle this? Do you reference a table of field descriptions within the instructions and then add it to an Appendix? Do you keep it in the instructions? I'd be grateful for ideas.
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