Help systems on applications can definitely serve a purpose, but the people using them are not the ones I'd initially expect. According to the Chapter 6 of Hoekman's "Designing the Obvious", the people most likely to use help systems are "experts" of the application who are very familiar with it. After thinking about it, it makes sense. If a user doesn't find an application's design obvious enough to use right away they will likely exit the application and try to find a quicker and easier solution. I will admit to being prone to this; I almost never use help features and always try to figure out things on my own. I'm one of those "won't ask for directions" guys. I know I'm not the only one. Because of these reasons, help features can not serve as an alternative to good and obvious design. You will likely scare people away from your application if you make it a necessity to read the help documents before use.
This does not make Help sections useless, however. Like I previously stated, those with experience in the program or application will likely use a lot more features than the average user. While it is best to make every facet of your design as obvious as possible, not everything your application does might be obvious. Advanced features can be complicated, but just because they are complicated doesn't mean they should be left out of your application. They could be incredibly important but lack an obvious way to be used. Help sections are vital in cases like this where users want to learn more about what an application can do, and how to do it.
Developing a persona for a product used by a super hero can be complicated, since in the end the super hero is a fictional person. The real people to keep in mind when creating a design are the fans of the super hero you are designing for. The fans will be the real consumer of the product you are designing, so it is crucial to keep them in mind. It won't be Batman or Captain America buying your product, it will be parents, comic book fans, and movie-goers.
Having a help section is obviously essential for any application, but what do you think about set-up wizards or introductory walk-throughs? Are those evidence of bad design, or do you think they can be necessary to bring beginner users up to at least the intermediate level quickly?
ReplyDeleteAs for the persona for project 5, what sort of fans should we focus on? Should we focus on a newly introduced fan of the series, or hard core fans who are more likely to buy merchandise? Should buying power be a primary factor in persona development?