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List:       kde-usability
Subject:    Re: How about a first-time interactive tutorial?
From:       Alistair Davidson <lord_inh () yahoo ! co ! uk>
Date:       2002-08-22 11:21:17
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Not sure where to insert my comments into this thread so I'll just do a 
general email...

I don't like the idea of testing users before giving them a tutorial. It'll be 
boring (even if it's short), possibly confusing to absolute newbies, and 
generally bad.

My preference would be for the tutorial to include a list of lessons, grouped 
together naturally, so an experienced user can glance down the list and think 
"Oh, I'd like to watch that lesson"


My other thought is that the best tutorials (and the only ones used very 
often, to my knowledge) are computer game tutorials. The way these work, 
usually, is that a box will pop up saying something like "Click here to move 
your tank", with an arrow pointing to where you should click. It then waits 
for you to click, the tank moves, and the box for the next action pops up.

I think this is by far the best way of doing tutorials, because it's 
interactive right the way through, and the lessons will be easier to remember 
because you've performed the task. Not only that, but it should be simple to 
store the whole thing in XML files and i18n it.


Here's a quick-and-dirty example of how it could work for us:

Excerpt from XML file "lesson2.xml":

<action trigger = "click">

  <message>
    <b><i>Click here</i></b><br>
    This is the "<b>K Menu</b>", where you go to run programs.
  </message>

  <xcoord>
    [BOTTOM-LEFT X COORD OF KMENU]
  </xcoord>
  <ycoord>
    [BOTTOM-LEFT Y COORD OF KMENU]
  </ycord>
  <height>
     [KMENU BUTTON HEIGHT]
   </height>
   <width>
      [KMENU BUTTON WIDTH]
   </width>

</action> 


In this example, the tutorial displays a box containing the message

"Click Here
This is the K Menu, where you go to run programs."

With a line pointing to the center of the K Menu button. When the user clicks 
on the button, the next 'action' is proceeded to. (there may be better ways 
of handling the "trigger" and formatting the XML, it's the general idea I 
want to get out there)

- --  
Alistair Davidson
Prying open your third eye since 1823
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