Re: Screenshots in help

[Matthew Paul Thomas <mpt myrealbox com>]

On Jul 23, 2006, at 6:32 AM, Joachim Noreiko wrote:
> --- Matthew Paul Thomas <mpt myrealbox com> wrote:
> ...
> > Before the BetterDesktop studies, other studies had
> > also found that people confuse screenshots with the actual
> > interface.  
> > <http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:Ab7nx7LLa3EJ: 
> > www.infomanagementcenter.com/enewsletter/200411/ 
> > secondary.htm+%22even+fairly+sophisticated+users+were+clicking+the+gra 
> > phic%22>
> >
> > More about avoiding screenshots:
> > <http://g2meyer.com/usablehelp/singles/263.html>
> >
> > When screenshots really are necessary, I suggest:
> > *   crop them to only the relevant control or window area
> > *   reduce them to 75% or so (as mentioned in the thread)
> > *   make them fade out on each side, so they look even less like a
> >     real window
> > *   make them short looping animations (about 1 fps), when
> >     appropriate for illustrating a process.
> ...
> I'm away right now -- could someone copy the salient
> points and links of the above to a new bug, so we
> don't forget -- file against either the Doc Handbook
> or the Style Guide, I forget which one talks about
> screenshots.

Done. <http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=348495>

> > An even better approach would be to add to yelp and GTK the ability  
> > to walk you through the real interface without screenshots. For  
> > example, in a "How do I send customized letters?" help page
> > for Abiword, clicking a "Guide Me" button might highlight the
> > "Tools" menu, then highlight the "Mail Merge…" item in the menu once
> > you opened it, then wait for you to choose a file before describing  
> > the next step, and so on.
>
> That's probably for even beyond Mallard...

Perhaps.

--
Matthew Paul Thomas
http://mpt.net.nz/