English 421Y: Technical Writing Online

Overall, Nathaniel and I thought the Proposal were strong, but we wanted to draw your attention to a few things we noticed when reviewing them.

• Your two instruction sets should differ in kind, not degree. This means that your expert set of instructions should not be just a cut-down version of the novice set (or vice versa). This is often the result of differentiating audiences solely on the basis of knowledge and experience, which is what happens when taking a systems-centered rather than user-centered approach. As the project description and Instructor Blog #4 state, we want to think about our audience groups as discreet entities with different needs, expectations, and values. Obviously, there will be overlaps between your two instruction sets, but keep in mind that we want to stay user-centered and think about the experiences the groups will have with the object or process. This comment on grfnpt's post about The Drudge Report touches this issue.
  
  
• Don't define one audience group as the negation of the other. Several people explained how the instructions for novices would cater to their needs, only then to state that the instructions for experts wouldn't have to contain so much hand holding. Make certain to define your audiences as what they are, not just what they aren't. The expert audience isn't only the negation of the novice group's ignorance, nor is the novice group only the negation of the expert group's expertise.
  
  
• Select formats for your instruction sets that are appropriate to topic. A one-page laminated piece of paper might be appropriate for changing oil, and an online .html document might be appropriate for explaining how to use Google Docs. You may need to use different formats for different audience groups, as jrdavies points out in his Proposal.

Nathaniel and I think that Zephyrus's Proposal about TrueCrypt and jrdavies's Proposal about creating a histogram in Excel are solid. Both these Proposals differentiate their audiences more in terms of needs, expectations, and values than in terms of knowledge and experience. They also pay attention to their contexts (where and how the objects/processes will be encountered by the separate audiences) and what formats for the instruction sets would be appropriate.

As always, feel free to contact your instructor with specific questions about your work.