Examining documentation and help systems since 2002.
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Gordon R. Meyer
Copyright 2002-2008
It's a light switch
Although the point of Global Nerdy's post about The Lightswitch That Might Explain a Lot About Java is not instructional design, it's a fun example of documentation gone wrong. Although I'm a big fan of contextual help, and a sticker on a light switch is certainly "embedded documentation," the text seems overly-complex and not task-orientated. Additionally, as a reading of the comments will show, many of the functions being described are typical and discoverable. Surely this is an example of documentation that nobody wants to read.
Posted: Friday, October 19, 2007 link to this item, respond to this item