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Subject:Re: Why do you need a nav system? From:dmbrown -at- brown-inc -dot- com To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Wed, 23 Jan 2002 08:28:27 -0800
Sue Ahrenhold wrote:
>
> I don't believe that many users are ready to give up their TOCs. When I
> learn a new program, the TOC is one of the first things I look at, as it
> gives me a view of the structure of the documentation, and, through it, the
> product.
I agree, but add that the trouble with a TOC is that it's just a representation of the document's structure. As such, all it can give you is an idea of where various concepts *might* be discussed. Like the book itself, you'd have to read the entire TOC to know whether you've found *all* the places where a given concept is discussed.
A good index gives you the exact locations of concepts, and the contexts in which they occur. It omits the meaningless instances, a big problem with concordances and full-text search. A good index shows you the interrelationships among concepts. By including synonyms, it also educates you on the terminology used in the document or program. For example, the single entry...
Search. See Find
...answers the question "I wonder what they call that in this program?" before the user is frustrated by searching for (and not finding!) the wrong term for the same concept.
It's nice to have a TOC, but most documents *need* an index.
--David
=============================
David M. Brown - Brown Inc.
dmbrown -at- brown-inc -dot- com
=============================
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