English 421Y: Technical Writing Online

I have a few comments and suggestions:

• Your graphics seem to be well selected. Do make sure your images remain consistent in terms of lighting and angle. Consistent images are a hallmark of professional instructions. You will also want your images to reflect what the user will see as they change their oil (account for what TCT calls the "physical context of use"). These "realistic" images will allow the user to match what she/he sees to what the instructions show.
• Do you plan on supplementing your graphics with elements that will focus the user's attention (e.g., labels, circles, arrows, highlights, etc.) when necessary?
• Watch your alignments throughout the document. You need to make sure that body text, images, and text boxes all fit the document's design logic.
• Are you comfortable with the 8.5 x 11 page size? Do you think that is appropriate for both sets of users? (This is a genuine question.) Again, consider the user's physical context of use.
• It is hard to tell what qualitative differences exists between the instructions. This maybe an issue just for the thumbnails (that you later resolve in the actual instruction sets), but the difference now appears to be the expert set is a scaled down version of the novice set. Remember, two different sets of users may need to differently designed instruction sets. You might check out Ben's thumbnails for an example to two similar yet distinct thumbnails for novice and expert audiences.
• Remember to focus on creating instruction sets that differ in kind rather than degree.

I could not really see that big of a difference between your novice and expert instruction sets. Also your sample graphics are really big, but I would assume that you are going to scale those down. I do not know if your graphics will have to be that large or not. I guess they might have to be in order to show the amount of detail that you need to present. Other than those two things I liked the layout of your instruction sets. It looked to me like you were going for a kind of flowchart look and feel.

• I like that your instructions include only a couple images per page. I imagine a person in the garage with a stapled set of your instructions, picking them up and putting them down while working. Having distinct looking pages with only a few photos/steps on each page will make it easy for the user to keep his or her place.
• You might consider thinning out the novice instructions, maybe even to one step per page with more pictures.
• I don't have a very clear idea of what information will go where on your thumbnail. What's the text on the sidebar? Is the arrow a graphic element, or is it there to represent the text extending? I would shy away from having competing progressions on your instructions.
• With your graphics, I suggest including simple illustrations that show overall layouts of the user's view from (1) under the hood and (2) underneath the car. This might help users locate different the parts of the engine they will be looking for.
• I would say you have a good idea for the format of your instructions. To identify possible problem areas, just imagine your user looking at your instructions while changing the oil.