Over the past twelve years, in some way, I have participated in the development of user manuals for computer software.

It has been an enlightening experience and I feel like I have received an opportunity that perhaps was not necessarily available to others.

I first worked as a computer trainer in Brazil and then when I came back to the states after living overseas for five years, I applied for a position with a small firm in Miami (Rene Perez and Associates) and I became the second technical writer there. In this position, I saw firsthand just how important documentation really was. Documentation for the system was used by literally EVERYONE, even the owner, Mr. Rene Perez himself! That is right. Documentation was used by other employees in sales and marketing, customer service, business development, and of course programming and quality assurance. I am talking about manuals that I was writing for the end-user of the program, the aviation companies themselves that had this software!

There is absolutely nothing that replace a quality end-user manual for a computer software program. In some respects, there is a push to move things to more of an on-demand and online platform where manuals are converted to training presentations or videos that sit on the Internet, and people can watch them when they want, etc. The problem with videos is that the user can potentially miss much critical information that is totally included in a traditional user guide.

So, my “take” on videos is this…they are useful for “short procedures” and marketing type presentations. However, for long operations that require many steps in a software program, I recommend the traditional user-guide, which of course can be re-presented via your web browser as an online manual. This is better than a training video. After all, what is the goal of documentation? Is it not user comprehension? I believe it is. Therefore, if you can see how videos simply cannot cover important steps and how users can get lost in the video, you will again see things from my angle.

Companies should NEVER abandon traditional end-user manuals or online manuals. They are the true foundation of program documentation and many other things, as I explained above. Software today is often complex and if the video-presenter is moving along assuming certain things that bypass regular documentation notes and ideas, then the user will soon be lost. Let’s do our best to truly educate the end-user.

Regards,

Keith

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