Beware the software developer who releases software without adequate user assistance (in plain English: user guides and online Help) for “The curse of the jilted Technical Author” may strike your product. This curse has just hit Google, who last week announced the demise of Google Wave. Google released Google Wave without any online Help or… Read more »
Category: usability
Video – People trying to make sense of poor instructions
We recorded the reactions of members of the public using various samples of instructions and user guides, and edited it into an advert for Cherryleaf. You can take a sneak peek of it below:
The tiny, tiny user guide
Here is a scan, in actual size, of two pages from a user guide that came with a speaker we purchased this week: Less isn’t always more, particularly when it comes to the size of the typeface.
Ellis to speak about documentation as an emotional experience at TCUK 2010
Ellis Pratt, Sales and Marketing Director at Cherryleaf, will be speaking at this year’s Technical Communication UK conference on “Documentation as an emotional experience for the user”. Many organisations are starting to look at creating a ‘customer experience strategy’. This is management-speak for generating customer advocacy, brand loyalty and an emotional attachment to a product or company…. Read more »
“Digital Natives” and the end of traditional hotline support
Are we seeing a new generation growing up who are shying away from telephone-based support in favour of text-based support? This is one conclusion we can draw from a New York Times article last week on teenagers (whom it called “Digital Natives”) and technology. It reported on research from the Pew Research Center that indicated: Children… Read more »