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Subject:RE: Trn'g Guides/Manuals vs User Guides/Man'ls From:"walden miller" <wmiller -at- vidiom -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Wed, 1 Nov 2000 11:54:04 -0700
> How can I sum up in a few sentences the differences
> between training guides and the general user guides?
Everyone's definition will be different...depending on the
documentation/marketing/corporate philosophy that rules the roost.
The difference between my training guides and user guides are as follows:
1. The purpose of my training guides are to get a user up and running ASAP
and consequently is not exhaustive in explaining the entire interface or API
or ...
2. My user manuals must be exhaustive in explaining the GUI
3. The training guides always use ancillary installed projects/assets/etc.
and have a focused tutorial approach. You actually work through projects
using real assets.
4. The user guide approaches explanations in a more generic form (and
assumes you do not have the installed ancillary material at hand).
The differences between my user guides and my reference guides (I know, you
didn't ask that question, but it seems to float at the edges...) are as
follows:
1. The organization of the reference guide is
logical/indexical/alphabetic/etc., while the organization of the user manual
is task-specific.
2. The reference manual provides details beyond the GUI of how each element
of product (e.g., datatype, function, editor, plug-in) functions, while the
user manual discusses the interaction between elements in regards to tasks.
As you can see, this means a lot of repeated information between the three
types of manuals. But it also addresses three specific needs: up-to-speed
training, task procedures, and reference look-up.
Often if the project is small enough, these manuals merge into one or two
documents. But I find it useful to understand the aim of each, regardless
of the number of final documents.
walden miller
director engineering services
vidiom systems
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