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| <title>User assistance support</title> |
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| |
| <h1>User assistance support</h1> |
| |
| <h3>What is user assistance?</h3> |
| |
| <p> |
| User assistance is a set of components that together introduce the user |
| to the product, guide the user through tasks, and help the user find more |
| information about the product. There are four basic components: |
| </p> |
| |
| <ul> |
| <li><a href="ua_intro.htm">Welcome</a></li> |
| <li><a href="ua_help.htm">Help</a></li> |
| <li><a href="ua_cheatsheet.htm">Cheat Sheets</a></li> |
| <li><a href="ua_statushandling.htm">Status Handling</a></li> |
| </ul> |
| |
| <h3>Welcome</h3> |
| |
| <p> |
| <a href="ua_intro.htm">Welcome</a> (also called Intro) support is a set of |
| extension points and workbench parts that allow plug-ins to define specialized |
| pages that introduce a platform product to new users. These extension points |
| can be used to create the "Initial User Experience" of the product in |
| the form of welcome pages. Welcome pages are intended to guide users into |
| discovering a product's functionality. They are typically shown the first time |
| a product is started. |
| </p> |
| |
| <h3>Help</h3> |
| |
| <p> |
| The <a href="ua_help.htm">help system</a> provides the raw building blocks to |
| structure and contribute documentation to the platform. It does not dictate |
| structure or granularity of documentation. You can choose the tools and |
| structure for your documentation that suits your needs. The help plug-in |
| allows you to describe your documentation structure to the platform using a |
| table of contents (toc) file. |
| </p> |
| |
| <p> |
| Help also includes context help support, where a user can |
| summon help for a particular element in the UI (e.g. by pressing F1 on Windows). |
| In addition, help provides the ability to perform a single search that finds |
| information from any number of sources (federated information search). |
| </p> |
| |
| <h3>Cheat Sheets</h3> |
| |
| <p> |
| <a href="ua_cheatsheet.htm">Cheat sheets</a> guide users through tasks. The |
| task is broken down into steps and presented to the user one step at a time, and |
| the user checks off the steps as he/she completes them. Cheat sheets come in two |
| forms: simple (one task, several steps), and composite (many sub-tasks, each |
| having many steps). Which one you use depends on the size and complexity of the |
| task you want to guide the user through. |
| </p> |
| |
| <h3>Status Handling</h3> |
| |
| <p> |
| <a href="ua_statushandling.htm">Status handling</a> is a facility that |
| allows to introduce a custom way of showing problems in the product to users. |
| A part of the facility is an extension point which allows to plug new status handler |
| specific for the product. This handler associated to the product is intended |
| to present the problem in the useful for users way. |
| </p> |
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