On 20 Jan 1997, Jason L Tibbitts III wrote:
> Yep. And writing documentation like this is really hard. We either need a
> professional or a bunch of user input. Perhaps the service provider folks
> can help?
Well:
a) I *am* a professional writer-about-technical-subjects. I am a
technical marketing manager for complex software which needs to be made
accessible to IS management...
b) Mostly, ISPs are part of the problem, not part of the solution. They
*don't*, for the most part, tell their users how to access resources,
expecting the information publishers to train their users for them. (Yes,
there are exceptions... but this was a reaction to recent failures-to-
communicate between Majordomo and a spate of Juno, AOL and Netcom users.
Currently, the help message and the error messages are part of the
software, not part of the documentation effort. I'd be pleased if people
on the -docs list would deal with this... but I don't see it happening.
As for web interfaces: I don't expect to supply one any time soon, and I
know there are many users who will never use one for this. Once we're
handling management by web, why not just put the messages there? An email
system needs a user-friendly email interface most of all.
--
ROGER B.A. KLORESE rogerk@QueerNet.ORG
2215-R Market Street #576 San Francisco, CA 94114 +1 415 ALL-ARFF
"There is only one real blasphemy -- the refusal of joy!" -- Paul Rudnick
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