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RE: Are "Easy Buttons" important in a Windows software installer?
Subject:RE: Are "Easy Buttons" important in a Windows software installer? From:"Margaret Cekis" <Margaret -dot- Cekis -at- comcast -dot- net> To:'Rédacteur en chef' <editorialstandards -at- gmail -dot- com>, <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com> Date:Tue, 10 Apr 2012 14:26:17 -0400
Kevin clarified his earlier "Are "Easy Buttons" important in a Windows
software installer?" post:
"The situation is one where we produce multiple variant hardware products:
- a PCI-bus card for installing in computers
- a separate enclosed-in-a-box version that can connect to a computer via
USB
- a stand-alone network-attached appliance version that goes in lights-out
server farms
- some peripheral hardware items that might or might not be needed with any
of the main items, above.
Formerly, we provided a software-driver-tools-and-SDK CD/DVD for each
product and for each peripheral device.
Most customers favored one or another product and bought, and deployed,
dozens or hundreds of just one kind. A smaller percentage of customers had
need for two or three different product variants (in whatever quantities),
and so they'd end up with a stack of CDs, often at different release
levels. " '
________________________________________
Kevin:
Since your customers may be installing one or several types of devices, I
think your first screen should explain that there is a single installer that
can handle all the listed products, Depending on how much info that screen
contains, it could just include a NEXT button, or the first selection list.
The first selection list should be the list of products with selection
checkboxes or buttons for the user to specify what products will be
installed.
The second selection screen should list only the items selected by the user,
with selection buttons or checkboxes for the Basic, Custom, or Default
(full) installation options you offer. (Where I've seen this type of choice,
there is an explanation that Basic provides the core or most common
features, but conserves disk space, and the user could do a Custom Update
later to add more features.) If the user selects Custom for any of the
products, a new window or screen displays a detailed selection list of
optional features for that product only. After the user makes a selection
for each product to be installed, and confirms that the selection process is
complete, the installation begins.
This way, once the users select the products to install, they only see
information relating to the selected items. The Custom options only display
if a custom installation is selected for a product. The screen sequence will
probably be harder to code, but it will minimize confusion for the users who
are installing only one or two products, and selecting a default
configuration for them..
Margaret Cekis, johns Creek GA .
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