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Subject:RE: How do users use help? From:kimber_hebert -at- acs-inc -dot- com To:<techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Wed, 22 Sep 1999 14:39:52 -0500
William Horton, in his book _Designing and Writing Online Documentation_, has
some information that might be useful to you. Once again, it comes down to
knowing your audience. In Chapter 3, "Access," he presents a table of retrieval
methods recommended for varying types of users. It's not possible for me to
reproduce here.
Suffice to say that for Expert users of a software product his recommended
methods are "Search by name, Full-text Search, Keyword Search."
For Occasional users, his highest recommendation is for a Keyword search.
These are recommendations for "semi-automatic" online systems, such as a fairly
context-sensitive help system.
