Re: (no subject)

[Liam Quin <liam holoweb net>]

On Wed, Nov 15, 2000 at 10:12:22AM -0600, Tom Musgrove wrote:
> the reason users use help as a last resort, is that help is generally almost
> USELESS to users who are not skilled at picking the search terms that the
> help creator used.

I did see a study pubilshed ina Digital Press book in the early 80s that
suggested a gender difference ebtween people who used Help, and saying
that a menu item "Explain" was more heavily used. The point being that
perhaps some people see asking for help as an admission of defeat.

The word "explain" implies that it's the computer's fault for being
unclear, not the user's fault for being stupid, and hence using an
Explain menu doesn't bruise the ego.  Or so it was claimed.

Lee

-- 
Liam Quin - Barefoot in Toronto - liam holoweb net - http://www.holoweb.net/
Ankh: irc.sorcery.net www.valinor.sorcery.net irc.gnome.org www.advogato.org
author, The Open Source XML Database Toolkit, Wiley, August 2000
Co-author, The XML Specification Guide, Wiley, 1999