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Subject:Re: Documentation on the WWW From:Elna Tymes <Etymes -at- LTS -dot- COM> Date:Wed, 2 Oct 1996 17:37:21 -0700
> > Are there any opinions about whether users, in general,
> >would prefer to down-load a .PDF copy of user documentation to read in
> >Acrobat Reader (similar to what they do now) or whether we should convert
> >to HTML and put the text itself online?
> <snip>
> >Also, might different kinds of documentation elicit different answers to
> >this question. For example, would it make sense to convert support
> >documentation to HTML and leave users documentation in .PDF format?
> This is a discussion I would *very* much like to see and read. Our
> doc. department is in the middle of evaluating the customers' doc.
> needs in just these terms.
Our experience has been that readers will use online docs for short,
to-the-point information, or for browsing, but they won't spend long
periods of time reading a single document online. If it's long, they
prefer to print it out and read it offline.
What this means is that you can use either .pdf or .htm files, but since
they're probably looking at the document with a regular online browser,
such as Navigator or Explorer, why bother with Acrobat?
There's still a market for ink-on-paper documents, in our experience.
