Help topics vs. help triggers

[Charles Davis]

On Sun, 2008-06-08 at 01:25 +0100, Matthew Paul Thomas wrote:
> On Jun 7, 2008, at 7:46 PM, Nick Ellery wrote:
> > ...
> > -- Perhaps a troubleshooting guide, similar to the one in the Official 
> > Ubuntu Book would be good.  Issues with X, dpkg, and the like could be 
> > added here
> > ...
> 
> I agree there should be more troubleshooting advice in the help, but I 
> don't think it should be in the form of a troubleshooting guide.
I tend to agree since an incomplete "troubleshooting section" gives a
bad first impression to new users. I'd much rather see prominet linkage
to the UCF as a source for help in trouble shooting than see a poorly
implemented troubleshooting guide.

> 
> Ubuntu Help is arranged by topic: files and folders, music, photos, and 
> video, keeping your computer safe, and so on. Troubleshooting, on the 
> other hand, is an example of a trigger -- the frame of mind that sends 
> someone into the help. Other triggers include "What does ______ mean?", 
> "Where can I find ______?", and "Give me a quick overview of this 
> topic".
> 
> In some cases a troubleshooting question will be solved by a page that 
> isn't specifically intended for troubleshooting. That's why it's better 
> to arrange help pages by topic than by trigger.
> 
> So an "I can’t open a folder" troubleshooting page should be in the 
> "Files, folders, and documents" section. A "When I plug in my camera, 
> nothing happens" troubleshooting page should be in the "Music, photos, 
> and video" section. An "I get an error when I try to check for updates" 
> troubleshooting page should be in the "Keeping your computer safe" 
> section. And so on.

I agree with this concept
> 
> Perhaps those on this mailing list who frequent Ubuntu forums could 
> write troubleshooting pages for the problems people most often report.
> 
The Ubuntu Forums Beginner Team ( from the absolute beginners forum ) is
starting to become more involved in helping to maintain wiki pages and a
couple of us are hoping to be of help in the system documentation, so
you will soon start to see much more feedback from the forum folks :)
> Cheers
> -- 
> Matthew Paul Thomas
> http://mpt.net.nz/
> 
> 
> ---AV & Spam Filtering by M+Guardian - Risk Free Email (TM)---
> 
> 

Cheers,
Chuck
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