Re: Interesting Article... fewest jobs lost in Tech Writing
UI designer? I've yet to work somewhere where there is one. As my IT friends
will confirm, UI design is often scene as another luxury. "After all, what
matters is what's under the bonnet."
Sad, isn't it? This whole thread has me thinking...
If we're supposed to be building products for _customers_ (the very people
that keep us in business) why is it that so many companies don't seem to give
a rat's you-know-what about the customers' wants/needs. How many customers
have been heard to say, "oh, that's ok. We don't care about a decent UI,
nor do we care about documentation. We have lots of time to poke around
and figure it out. Don't worry about it."
For GUI applications, if the GUI is so good and so intuitive that documentation
isn't required, GREAT! Personally I haven't seen too many that are 100%
usable for 100% of the people using the product.
In the situation of CLI interfaces, if the user can't figure out what they're
supposed to do at the command line level, then what? GUI-less might be
fine; but documentation-less? At some point, something or someone has
to show/teach them how to use the commands. Maybe it isn't a tech writer
who provides the information, but someone must.
Whether the customer is spending tens, hundreds or thousands of $$$ for a
product, I'm certain they want to be able to use it quickly and effectively.
If the UI is bad and the documentation is only 75% complete or is non-existent,
do you suppose they'll come back for more? Not too likely!
A complete and _useful_ package (whatever that entails) reflects the
professionalism and credibility of the company selling the product--and, ultimately,
their bottom line.
-J.
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