Aesthetics isn't the only thing that you should be striving for when desiging a user manual template or the style sheet of an online help system. When creating technical documentation, usability, readability, and simplicity are at least just as crucial.
The design should please the eye, but at the same time it must communicate the content clearly. In addition, paragraph styles and character styles should be efficient to use for the author when writing the document. The layout process should be automated as much as possible. Because most user assistance documents are frequently updated during theit life cycle, an automated layout process is much more important here than with other kinds of literature.
Setting up templates and style sheets that are efficient to use when creating and updating user assistance requires a lot of experience in technical writing. The rules presented in this book are the essence of this experience.
All chapters provide various examples that you can use for inspiration and as starting points for your own designs.
Users want manuals that are easy to read, with short sentences, simple words, and unambiguous instructions. Unfortunately, writing plain language is much more difficult than writing overblown instructions that only an expert can understand. Writing complex texts is simple-writing simple texts is complex.
This book shows you how to write simple user assistance rather than complex user annoyance. As it's a book about stating your message clearly, it also states its own messages clearly. It's free of boring theory and free of highbrow grammar terms, but gives you clear recommendations and catchy examples that you can easily remember and apply to your own work.
Topics covered:
General technical writing principles that make your texts plain, simple, and easy to understand.
On the topic level: Rules for writing "Concept topics," "Task topics," and "Reference topics."
On the paragraph level: Rules for writing the standard elements that form a topic, such as headings, subheadings, procedures, lists, tables, warnings, notes, tips, examples, cross-references, and links.
On the sentence level: Rules for building plain and unambiguous sentences.
On the word level: Recommendations for using simple words.
Spelling and punctuation FAQ.
Grammar and word choice FAQ.
Standard terms and phrases.
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