Online Help Systems
Design and Implementation
Will be published approx. on 1. May 1988
Book
Hardback
200 pages
978-0-89391-472-1 (ISBN)
Description
This text summarizes the existing knowledge/experience about the design and implementation of help systems. It should help readers to understand design alternatives for help systems, make tradeoff decisions about possible features, be aware of implementation problems and strategies, and become familiar with the development cycle.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Intellect
Target group
College/higher education
Professional and scholarly
ISBN-13
978-0-89391-472-1 (9780893914721)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Content
Preface ix
1 Introduction 1
Why help systems are needed 2
What is a help system 3
Conceptual models of help 4
Design alternatives 6
Research issues 7
Implementation considerations 8
Relationship between helps, training, and documentation 9
Who this book is for 10
What the rest of the book covers 11
2 Design Alternatives 13
Static vs dynamic helps 14
Multiple levels of help 17
Accessing help systems 18
User versus system-initiated helps 19
Screen formatting 20
Extensibility 23
Other considerations 24
Summary 26
3 Examples of Help Systems 27
Helps for a command language (CROSSTALK) 28
Data Entry Fields (VM SCHEDULE) 29
Multiple-level helps (WORDSTAR) 30
Multiple help options (MCI MAIL) 31
Context-sensitive helps (LOTUS) 33
Prompting helps (SHERPA) 35
Helps in a programming environment (SYMBOLICS) 37
Guiding a database search (MELVYL) 40
Hypertext (GUIDE) 41
Summary 43
4 Research on Helps 45
Experimental results 46
Cognitive psychology 49
Artificial intelligence 56
Summary 59
5 Implementation 61
Analysing user requirements 63
Specifications 64
Prototyping 65
Coding/writing 65
Tryouts 66
Quality control 67
Releases 68
Maintenance 69
Cost/benefit tradeoffs 69
Summary 72
6 Guidelines 73
Make the help system easy to access and easy to return from 76
Make helps as specific as possible 76
Collect data to determine what helps are needed 78
Give users as much control of the help system as possible 79
Different types of users need different helps 80
Help messages must be accurate and complete 80
Don't use helps to compensate for poor interface design 82
Summary 83
7 Summary and Conclusion 85
For DP/MIS managers 86
For software designers/developers 87
For training/documentation specialists 89
For researchers 90
For the rest of us 91
Glossary 93
References 97
Appendix A: Programming Considerations 101
Appendix B: Software Tools 107
Author Index 111
Subject Index 113
1 Introduction 1
Why help systems are needed 2
What is a help system 3
Conceptual models of help 4
Design alternatives 6
Research issues 7
Implementation considerations 8
Relationship between helps, training, and documentation 9
Who this book is for 10
What the rest of the book covers 11
2 Design Alternatives 13
Static vs dynamic helps 14
Multiple levels of help 17
Accessing help systems 18
User versus system-initiated helps 19
Screen formatting 20
Extensibility 23
Other considerations 24
Summary 26
3 Examples of Help Systems 27
Helps for a command language (CROSSTALK) 28
Data Entry Fields (VM SCHEDULE) 29
Multiple-level helps (WORDSTAR) 30
Multiple help options (MCI MAIL) 31
Context-sensitive helps (LOTUS) 33
Prompting helps (SHERPA) 35
Helps in a programming environment (SYMBOLICS) 37
Guiding a database search (MELVYL) 40
Hypertext (GUIDE) 41
Summary 43
4 Research on Helps 45
Experimental results 46
Cognitive psychology 49
Artificial intelligence 56
Summary 59
5 Implementation 61
Analysing user requirements 63
Specifications 64
Prototyping 65
Coding/writing 65
Tryouts 66
Quality control 67
Releases 68
Maintenance 69
Cost/benefit tradeoffs 69
Summary 72
6 Guidelines 73
Make the help system easy to access and easy to return from 76
Make helps as specific as possible 76
Collect data to determine what helps are needed 78
Give users as much control of the help system as possible 79
Different types of users need different helps 80
Help messages must be accurate and complete 80
Don't use helps to compensate for poor interface design 82
Summary 83
7 Summary and Conclusion 85
For DP/MIS managers 86
For software designers/developers 87
For training/documentation specialists 89
For researchers 90
For the rest of us 91
Glossary 93
References 97
Appendix A: Programming Considerations 101
Appendix B: Software Tools 107
Author Index 111
Subject Index 113