Creating a User Manual
User Manuals are in many ways a necessary evil. For Software Developers like myself, functionality seems both intuitive and natural. This is, of course, because I made the program do that. At the end of the day, however, user guides are often seen as grunt work that is done as an after thought.
This is not a good way to think about a User Manual. A user manual, instead should be considered in the process of creating a project. This is true for several reasons.
Start with the end in mind.
When I create a script for myself, it isn’t important that the process be obvious, intuitive, or simple: Only that it works. In contrast, when creating a tool to be used by others, building an intuitive system is the difference between a successful product and a failure.
Build things in a learnable way.
Making a manual is a fact of life. When you start on a new project, think about what you are doing and how you would teach it. When working with an application, put the most important information in the center of the screen. Buttons meant to be pressed in quick succession should be placed near each other. Good things should be green, bad things should be red. These little things can be the difference between confusion and intuition.
It is little thing like this that help make good developers. If you aren’t sure what these things look like, open an app that you go to frequently. When you are at these sites, look for things that you like. Look for things you don’t like. Build your website the way you want it and the manual will always be easier.
