Tag Archives: findability

Moving Beyond the TOC in Organizing Help Content — Illustrated Edition

May 22, 2013 » 14 Replies

I’m working on some slides for an upcoming presentation and wanted to post them here because they encapsulate a lot of my thoughts about organizing help content and findability. Let me know if you have feedback. I tried to create the slides as a storybook.

Why Long Topics Are Better for the User

May 6, 2013 » 6 Replies

In my previous post, Do Short Topics Make Information More Findable, I argued that shorter topics make it more difficult for users to find information. I ended the post by saying that topics that are more substantial make content more findable. But how big should the topics be? Obviously not the length of a book, Continue Reading »

The Importance of Contextual Navigation, or Cross References in Topics

One of the most hotly debated topics in tech comm deals with how writers should cross reference other topics within a help topic. Some writers feel that including contextual or inline links in your help topics distracts low-literacy readers by encouraging them to navigate elsewhere. The low-literacy readers, they argue, end up bouncing from page to Continue Reading »

Why Do We Need Navigation At All?

In Designing Web Navigation, James Kalbach starts out by asking why we need navigation at all. Technically, it’s possible to put all the content on the same page. You can show and hide the content through Javascript or other techniques. Although he doesn’t mention it, technical writers are probably familiar with twisties, or drop-down hotspots. Continue Reading »

Webinar Recording — Organizing Help Content: Breaking Out of Topic-Based Hierarchies

I recently gave a presentation to the Southwestern Ontario STC chapter called Organizing Help Content: Breaking Out of Topic-Based Hierarchies. Here’s a recording of the presentation: Webinar recording Slides only Audio only

Looking at Breadcrumbs in a New Way

One of the findability features in our help systems that we often overlook is the breadcrumb. Breadcrumbs typically sit above the page title and highlight the hierarchical path that leads to where you are. Here’s a screenshot of a typical breadcrumb, taken from Adobe Illustrator’s help: Greg Nudelman discusses breadcrumbs in one of his chapters Continue Reading »

Using Tags to Increase Findability

I recently read Tagging: People-Powered Metadata for the Social Web (2008), by Gene Smith. Smith dives into tagging as a method for adding metadata to resources, which in turn increases the organization and findability of the resources. Traditional help authoring tools categorize resources through folders (a carryover from Windows folders), whereas web platforms typically use tags. Tags Continue Reading »

Slides from STC Webinar on Organizing Content (Findability)

Here are my slides from the STC webinar I presented on organizing content (findability). The official title of the webinar was “Organizing Content: Breaking Out of Topic-Based Hierarchies.” I added detailed notes for each slide. This should make the presentation understandable even without the audio recording. You can download the presentation in two formats: PDF format Continue Reading »

My STC Webinar on Organizing Content — This Thursday at 4pm EST

I’m giving an STC webinar this Thursday. Here’s the description: Organizing Help Content: Breaking Out of Topic-Based Hierarchies Organizing help content so that users can both find and learn information often requires technical writers to break out of the traditional topic-based folders and move toward faceted navigation, search engine optimization, interface text, level-based help, and Continue Reading »

Podcast: Organizing Help Content: Breaking Out of Topic-based Hierarchies

The recording is available in a variety of formats: Audio with Slides MP3 Audio Only PowerPoint Show File PowerPoint Original File iPod format I recently gave a presentation at the STC Summit in Sacramento titled “Organizing Help Content: Breaking Out of Topic-based Hierarchies.” I would have recorded my presentation, but recording is not allowed. I Continue Reading »

May 22, 2013 » Don Day: Tom, the editor that you were trying to access aat expedita.info is Oxygen’s Java-based Web component.... (Moving Beyond the TOC in Organizing Help Content — Illustrated Edition
May 22, 2013 » John Tait: Great article – thank-you I’ve used DITA’s subject scheme maps to define a taxonomy and... (Moving Beyond the TOC in Organizing Help Content — Illustrated Edition
May 22, 2013 » Tom Johnson: I’m currently only tagging at the page level. I hadn’t thought about tagging more granular... (Moving Beyond the TOC in Organizing Help Content — Illustrated Edition
May 22, 2013 » Tom Johnson: Mark, re optimizing for the web, you have a good point, but I think in many scenarios, the... (Moving Beyond the TOC in Organizing Help Content — Illustrated Edition
May 22, 2013 » Tom Johnson: For faceted browsing, see Peter Morville’s works. I wrote about faceted browsing a while ago at a... (Moving Beyond the TOC in Organizing Help Content — Illustrated Edition
May 22, 2013 » Tom Johnson: Thanks Heather. I created these illustrations in Adobe Illustrator. It’s pretty easy to make simple... (Moving Beyond the TOC in Organizing Help Content — Illustrated Edition
May 22, 2013 » Tom Johnson: Don, thanks for your insight. You’re absolutely right that the difference between a TOC and a list... (Moving Beyond the TOC in Organizing Help Content — Illustrated Edition