Re: Documentation not as important anymore?

[Len Olszewski <saslpo -at- UNX -dot- SAS -dot- COM>]

From Anatole Wilson:

> Here'a a quote from a magazine called Newsbytes.  It's about an industry
> study conducted by Sentry Market Research:


[...]

>    Ease-of-use, the number one feature last year, with "very
>  important" ratings from 66 percent of survey participants, is
>  slightly behind support this year with a 71 percent score. "

> The obvious conclusions are that the customers don't really understand
> what they need (if they read the manuals they wouldn't need so much support),
> and that they're obviously not making the connection between good
> documentation and ease-of-use.


You can also conclude that the customers understand exactly what they
want; software easy enough to use without recourse to the documentation,
and a preference to speak with someone rather than to read a book.

Not my preference, incidentally. I *like* reading manuals.

> So what do we do, as technical communicators, to get customers to make
> these connections? A manager or exec readin this study might conclude
> their money is better spent on a couple of people answering service calls
> rather than on writers, designers, online help-building software, and
> printing costs.

Better still are products designed to be as intuitive as possible, with
elements of documentation cleverly built into the product itself. In
other words, products should *document themselves*. Whatever is left
over should be put onto a small index card, and given to the tech
support guys. 8-)

Of course, this isn't possible most of the time. But, it's a good thing
to shoot for, isn't it?

|Len Olszewski, Project Manager  | "Vultures don't eat sponge cake."  |
|saslpo -at- unx -dot- sas -dot- com|Cary, NC, USA|  - Trinidad proverb                |
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| Opinions this ludicrous are mine. Reasonable opinions will cost you.|