In researching what developers wanted to learn about writing documentation for users, the most common issue related to how much, or how little, they should write. One developer said: “I would want to know what is the minimum I should write. If you can persuade me what is the necessity of each thing I’m capturing, and… Read more »
Category: Technical Documentation
Could we use psychometric profiling of users in User Assistance?
In the How Powerful is Facebook’s Algorithm? (The Inquiry, BBC World Service), quantitative social scientist David Stillwell revealed computers can predict our personalities based on our Facebook activity. So could we use psychometric profiling of users in User Assistance?
Getting users to read the Help rather than call support
We spotted an interesting statement by the “Father of Behaviour Design”, BJ Fogg: “For somebody to do something – whether it’s buying a car, checking an email, or doing 20 press-ups – three things must happen at once. The person must want to do it, they must be able to, and they must be prompted to… Read more »
Is documentation a dirty word?
Daryl Colquhoun has written an article in tcWorld about the international standard ISO/IEC/IEEE 26512. He explained the standard is going to be revised and renamed: from “Systems and software engineering – Requirements for managers of user documentation” to “Systems and software engineering – Requirements for managers of information for users”. The reason for this, he states, is… Read more »
GDS publishes its new design for technical documentation
The Government Digital Service has been working on establishing a standard design for its technical (i.e. developer) documentation. This content is for systems architects, developers and users of the GOV.UK platforms and APIs. You can see an example at: GOV.UK Platform as a Service Cherryleaf was given a preview of the new design a few months… Read more »