Overview

This text summarizes the existing knowledge/experience about the design and implementation of help systems. It should help readers to understand design alternatives for help systems, make tradeoff decisions about possible features, be aware of implementation problems and strategies, and become familiar with the development cycle.

Full Product Details

Author:   Greg Kearsley
Publisher:   Intellect
Imprint:   Intellect Books
Dimensions:   Width: 16.00cm , Height: 1.60cm , Length: 22.70cm
Weight:   0.376kg
ISBN:  

9780893914721

ISBN 10:   089391472
Pages:   200
Publication Date:   01 May 1988
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Professional and scholarly ,  Undergraduate ,  Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Out of stock  
The supplier is temporarily out of stock of this item. It will be ordered for you on backorder and shipped when it becomes available.

Table of Contents

Preface               ix   1     Introduction               1           Why help systems are needed               2           What is a help system               3           Conceptual models of help               4           Design alternatives               6           Research issues               7           Implementation considerations               8           Relationship between helps, training, and documentation               9           Who this book is for               10           What the rest of the book covers               11   2     Design Alternatives               13           Static vs dynamic helps               14           Multiple levels of help               17           Accessing help systems               18           User versus system-initiated helps               19           Screen formatting               20           Extensibility               23           Other considerations               24           Summary               26   3     Examples of Help Systems               27           Helps for a command language (CROSSTALK)               28           Data Entry Fields (VM SCHEDULE)               29           Multiple-level helps (WORDSTAR)               30           Multiple help options (MCI MAIL)               31           Context-sensitive helps (LOTUS)               33           Prompting helps (SHERPA)               35           Helps in a programming environment (SYMBOLICS)               37           Guiding a database search (MELVYL)               40           Hypertext (GUIDE)               41           Summary               43   4     Research on Helps               45           Experimental results               46           Cognitive psychology               49           Artificial intelligence               56           Summary               59   5     Implementation               61           Analysing user requirements               63           Specifications               64           Prototyping               65           Coding/writing               65           Tryouts               66           Quality control               67           Releases               68           Maintenance               69           Cost/benefit tradeoffs               69           Summary               72   6     Guidelines               73           Make the help system easy to access and easy to return from               76           Make helps as specific as possible               76           Collect data to determine what helps are needed               78           Give users as much control of the help system as possible               79           Different types of users need different helps               80           Help messages must be accurate and complete               80           Don't use helps to compensate for poor interface design               82           Summary               83   7     Summary and Conclusion               85           For DP/MIS managers               86           For software designers/developers               87           For training/documentation specialists               89           For researchers               90           For the rest of us               91   Glossary               93     References               97   Appendix A: Programming Considerations               101   Appendix B: Software Tools               107   Author Index               111   Subject Index               113  

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