By Jim Parry
One of the great things about Lotus Domino Development is that most projects start out as an initial request for "a small database application," but as soon as others hear about the application you're building, a deluge of requests begins arriving. All these requests seem to begin with, "It would be really great if you could add....". Before you know it, your "small database application" has grown into a majestic, full blown, application.
I enjoy building applications that make people say, "Wow! I didn't know you could make it do that!" So I don't mind the, "It would be really great if you could add..." types of requests. In fact, the more challenging a project is, the more I enjoy building it. The downside is teaching the user how to use the application, and more importantly, teaching them how to use the cool functionality I added to it.
Getting your point across
As I see it, basically you have a few options for teaching the end user how to use your application:
- You could teach each user individually. If you support thousands of clients like I do, this option's out the window.
- You could create a printed instructional manual. Be aware that the only time anybody will actually ever use this is in the event they need to prop up one of the legs of their desk to stop the wobbling, so that doesn't appear to be a valid option.
- You could build context sensitive help into the Lotus Domino Application. But, how many users will actually read the help document when they have a telephone and the application developer's phone number? About as many as would have read the manual, most likely.
- You could create context sensitive animated help using the Microsoft Agent API. Yes, really! You can build animated help that's not only context sensitive, but also easy to build.
I was in this situation recently and decided that the last option was the only viable solution. I discovered that the entertainment factor of the animation actually interested the user enough for him to read (and listen to) the information presented in the help document. Plus, I received numerous phone calls and email messages after deploying this option--not with support questions, but instead with the oohs and aahs that I love so much.
Soon though, I saw a flaw in my plan. The animated context sensitive help was great when a user was completing a form, for example, and had a question. However, the users now wanted a tutorial that would provide a complete overview of the application. I thought that since the animations were hugely successful with the help file it would be a great idea to create a tutorial using the same tools.