Re: Title Page Suggestion

[Pat Costello <Patrick Costello Sun COM>]

Hi Eric, 

Thanks for your mail outlining your view of the requirements for the TOC. 
Looking at the situation purely from a user point of view, everything on the TOC 
should be doing something to instruct the user about the application. I agree 
that the title of the document should appear on the TOC, but beyond that do the 
following items really add to the user quest for technical information:

- Author (why should the user care? Also, in the case of the name of corporate 
authors such as Sun appears at the top of the TOC, then there is a branding 
issue.)

- Developer (this need is catered for already in the About section of each 
applet and application. How does the name of the developer at this point on TOC 
add to the usability of the documentation?)

- Last date updated (why should the user care if the information was updated 
last week or a year ago? The user assumes that the information is current, 
whatever the date of last update. How does this date information add to 
usability?)

I'm not saying that the above information is not important, on the contrary it 
is vital, but it is meta-information that is aimed at a different audience than 
the user. The meta-information is for the community, and as such should not be 
visible to an end-user, unless they specifically go looking for it. 

Does anyone else have any opinions about this question? 

Pat

<snip id="eric">

I think that there needs to be something more than just the TOC on the beginning 
page of our documentation.  I think that the reader needs to see the title of 
the documentation, the current author, the last date it was updated and the 
current 
developer (if pertinent).  I think that the current author's name, current 
developer's name, and the last date it was updated should have links to the 
expected 
information in the title page.

The reader should know some basic information about the application and the 
documentation by just glancing at the starting page.  The links will provide an 
intuitive way for the reader to view the title page.  The amount of information 
to 
be displayed is small and shouldn't be a distraction to the reader if they only 
want to cruise the documentation.  The current author and current developer 
should 
be displayed in the starting page so the reader has no doubt who to contact in 
case 
they need to.  Otherwise having a list of authors and developers in the title 
page 
is not very intuitive as to who the reader should contact.  Also having the last 
date the documentation was updated lets the reader know how old the 
documentation.  

Eric Baudais

</snip>