English 421Y: Technical Writing Online

The instructions for the novice and expert users are for completely different tasks. I think they are supposed to be instructions for the same task but tailored towards different types of users. Regardless, I will do my best to answer the questions asked in your usability test document. My comments are mainly pertaining to the novice instructions for installing FreeBSD.

1. Are the novice graphics helpful?

Yes, your graphics are vital to the instructions. Without them, it would be much harder to perform the tasks. However, your graphics are somewhat panelized. You should work on improving their quality.

2. Were the commands in the expert instruction set easy to find?

Well, I never had to search for commands. They are meant to be followed in order to complete a single task.

3. Were the instructions really confusing at any point?

Yes. Refer to the part of the instructions that says:

“To create a partition select the disk at the top of the screen…”

It is not clear that the user should create a partition. By saying “to …” you indicate that the user should do this only if they chose to do it. Right after that, the instructions get a lot more confusing. You say “We will create a 2GB /home, a 2GB /var, a 2GB swap and leave the rest in /”. This seems to indicate the subsequent instructions will specify how this is done. They don’t! The novice user is somehow expected to figure this out. I think this is a very unrealistic requirement.

4. What should be changed in the final version?

Make sure you provide a lot more detailed instructions for novice users. Be consistent with the amount of detail you show. Sometimes you give a lot of instructions.

Also, make sure your novice and expert instructions cover the same task.

5. Explain why any of the instructions were confusing.

Please refer to the answer to #3.

6. Should the format be altered?

I think that your images are of very bad quality. Improving those would make the instructions much better. The image captions look like instructions. You should emphasize that they are captions by perhaps making the captions smaller and place them right below the images.

Also, mix instructions and images better. You have two pages of images only. Why? What are people supposed to do with those images?

Typo: “After creating you virtual machine…”

1. The graphics that were provided for the novice set of instructions were extremely helpful in showing users how to complete a wide array of tasks.

2. I had no problems trying to find the commands in the expert set of instructions.

3. I did not find the instructions to be confusing in the novice set. They are very thoroughal and precise. I have some experience working with programs like these, so for someone that may not have much experience, I am not able to comment for them. For me though, I found the instructions to be clear and helpful.

4. For the novice set of instructions, I do not have much to say for what needs to be changed. You did a good job on writing that set. For the expert set of instructions, just like estefano said, I would recommend that you try and find a way to write a set of instructions that relate to the novice set in some way. I'm also under the assumption that both sets are supposed to be about the same topic not different ones.

5. I do not have any explanations for any confusing parts because I didn't find any of it confusing.

6. I believe that the format for the novice set should not be altered. You did a great job. As for the expert set of instructions refer to what I stated in question 4.