The readings this week focused on editing and revising your documents so they achieve everything you as an author set out to achieve. The readings form TCT gave a very detailed break down of the editing process and steps involved. I think one of the most helpful parts of this reading though was the tables with some of the most common grammatical mistakes or the list of words that are commonly misused. While writing our instructions for the project making sure they are free of grammatical and usage errors goes a long way to making the instructions look much more professional and finished.
The instructor blog focused more on testing the usability of the documents, which in our case are instruction sets. To me the importance of usability testing cannot be underestimated. Because the basic idea of instructions is that they are used to do something, usability testing should be one of, if not the most important, part of the process. If instructions aren't usable then there really wasn't any point in writing them in the first place.
To test the usability of my instruction set, I believe a document markup will provide the best feedback on the usability of my instruction sets. I think the best way to find out if the instructions work is to have someone actually follow the instructions, and then see if they are able to do what the instructions are supposed to help you do.
Also some questions I would like the user to answer are:
- Do the screen shots do a good job of clarifying the steps?
- Do the screen shots show the correct windows for that step in the process?
- Are the novice steps simple enough that anyone could follow them?
- Was it easy to search the document for the steps you were looking for?
- Are there anyways to improve on the design to make the instructions more effective and easier to use?
If you can't actually use it whats the point?
I also liked how the reading gave all those examples of misused words and grammatical errors. I think seeing that will make me more conscious of what I am actually writing and therefore make a better document overall. Like you said, usability might be the most important thing to think about while writing documents such as instructions. If the usability isn’t there then what is the point of even writing them? I think that document markup is probably going to be used by most of the class because that seems to be the best thing for what we are doing. I plan on using document markup myself.
Markup / Survey Hybrid
You make a good point: these instructions are based on performance. Therefore, usability testing is important to receive valuable feedback from functional users. Feedback is one of the strongest ways to improve work.
I also decided to use document markup for my usability test. I find that it is most efficient and constructive. In addition, while looking over some recent posts, I recently decided I might fuse both the document markup and survey testing techniques for my approach as you show. I think it is a good way to point the readers in the correct direction relative to helpful feedback.
Question Revisions
As with most software instructions, I also think that a document mark-up will be one of the most effective usability testing techniques. Since the reader is likely to be at a desk for many situations, it's easy for the user to follow the steps and take notes during the process. As for the survey questions, I think that a few of them could be reworded if you want more valuable answers from the audience. Instead of asking whether the screen shots do a "good" job of clarifying the steps, maybe ask if the screen shots are "effective" in clarifying the steps. The word "good" can be interpreted differently by people. Some think of it as being closer to "great," whereas others see it as "fair." In my opinion, people will give you better feedback if they note the effectiveness of the screen shots instead. Also, your question about novice steps asks if the document can be followed by "anyone." Previously we were told that novice instructions are drafted as to help a beginner user, but not treat them like an idiot. Therefore I think that your question should ask whether your novice instructions are usable by all novice users. It's impossible to create a document for "anyone" and everyone, so maybe it would be a better idea to be more specific in the question.