Re: Dead-end Online Help Path?

[Sella Rush <sellar -at- APPTECHSYS -dot- COM>]

My mother started school this week.  At 57, she's decided to become an
environmental engineer.  She told me last week:  "Ten years ago I thought I
was too old to change careers.  Just think where I'd be now if I'd taken the
plunge then."

Do you want to say that in ten years?

Re your "dinosaur" help files, I wonder if the problem is your presentation.
When talking to hiring managers, tell them why you made the decisions you
made, what audience characteristics were pertinent and how your system
responds appropriately.  Tell them how the audience uses the system and how
it benefits them.  Did you point out that the system actually is context
sensitive in that F1 brings up the pertinent topic?

Personally I don't use What's This help much because of the type of audience
I have (developers) and the applications we create.  But I do use Help
buttons in dialog boxes, I do provide "embedded" instructions and work hard
to make the interface design do as much communication work as possible.

And remember this:  everyone is playing catch-up these days (to steal a line
from Whoopi G.)  Seriously.  No matter what their age, no matter how many
years they've been in this business.  There's been so much new stuff coming
down the pike lately that very few people, at least in software development,
have the luxury of resting on what they already know.

Sella Rush
mailto:sellar -at- apptechsys -dot- com
Applied Technical Systems (ATS)
Bremerton, Washington
Developers of the CCM Database


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