Manuals

[David Jondreau]

When you produce a solution for a client, do you include manuals? A Help section in the db itself? A printed file? PDF? What do you use to create a User's Guide to your solution?

Looking for general advice as I'm finding this aspect of development lacking for me.

Thanks

[bcooney]

Really, our wonderful interface design does not need documentation!

Seriously, it depends on the project. Usually, a few days of training and no user guide is necessary. Sometimes a "cheat sheet". On a commercial runtime, a 70pp User Guide, written in Word and included as a PDF.

I've had clients who write their own User guide bcs they distribute the solution to other employees and there's a lot of industry specific lingo and business process that they wish to communicate, rather than "how to" it's more data specific.

No joke, documentation can take as much time, if not more, as development time.

PS: Tool tips, sometimes help screens, omg I think I've managed every approach over the years. Nothing hurts more than spending hours on a user guide that never gets read. We used to laugh, just give everyone a binder full of blank pages as a security blanket.

[Mike D.]

For one particular project, I did supply a User Manual with lots of screen shots and a flow chart. However, that client was extremely computer illiterate. It was for a small town government so I knew that there was a probability that the end user would likely change every couple years depending on election results.

[David McQueen]

I have written manuals at the request of a client. I don't know if they ever used them.

I have written a help system. It is a simple non hierarchial help system that has several different layouts to facilitate all text or text plus on graphic etc. It had provision for the user to author help files.I still use this as an on line help system in some solutions. I had one fellow purchse it to couple with his own sales database to give his salesmen some direction.

Lately I have been making screen moives using SnapZ Pro X on the Mac. these are low resolution QuickTime movies. These have been really successful. It is much less scary to a client than the printed directions.

In general,as stated above, I find training needs are minimal with a well designed system. A half day to a day on most systems is more than adequate. Part of this is because on a custom solution, if you are doing you job correctly, you are bending FileMaker to reflect their existing business instead of the other way round. So they will find the program intuitive.

If you want to get a look at a movie, I have two up on my site for the Canadian and the American Nutrient Databases. The movie for the Canadian one is located at:

http://www.lichen-software.com/can_nut_movie.html

You will need QuickTime Player to watch.

Have fun.

[JerrySalem]

I find that writing 'cheet sheets' for the end user as you are doing development actually helps in the programming.

I will make a cheet sheet, then try to follow my own directions. Often I will discover an extra button or feature that is missing. For example, creating a button to update Customer information while creating a new invoice (without interupting the create a new invoice process)

The bonus at the end is that you have documentation.