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RE: TOC article in INTERCOM -- things that made me go "HUH??"
Subject:RE: TOC article in INTERCOM -- things that made me go "HUH??" From:"Sean Brierley" <sbri -at- haestad -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Fri, 13 Dec 2002 13:56:15 -0500
What if you only listed Heading level 1?
FWIW, engineers at my company use the TOC first, index second, and
seldom fire-up the search. Personally, I'd prefer they just use the
index, I put a lot of work into it.
-----Original Message-----
From: jgarison -at- ide -dot- com [mailto:jgarison -at- ide -dot- com]
IMHO, I think most TOCs in online help are unusable, unused, and a waste
of
time.
I have a 900-topic HTML-based Help file for an enterprise-wide
application.
If I were to construct a typical expand/collapse TOC, it will be in
excess
of 15 FEET long (at 5 lines/inch). When viewed in a six-inch tall
window, it
is essentially useless.
I have replaced our TOC with a search engine, good organization, and
relevant links on each page. In almost 2 years, no one has complained.
When I presented this approach at WinWriters' Help Technology Update
Conference in August, I expected to get some grief about it. I got none.
Included in my presentation was this quote from Jared Spool, principal
and
founder of User Interface Engineering (www.uiw.com):
"In 15 years of testing help systems, not one test subject has used the
TOC."
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