Topics in Usability
Usability of Documentation and Help

HeuristicsDocuments and Documentation Online Help

Related Topics:
Heuristic Evaluation
Readability Research

Heuristics and General Guidelines

Purho, Vesa.  Evaluating the Usability of Documentation - Heuristic Inspections for Documentation April 2000, Usability Interface

Usability Checklist for Documentation - A checklist used for local STC chapter online competitions (RTF file)

Documentation Usability Techniques from the Usability Toolkit

The Usability Toolkit contains several checklists and other sets of guidelines

Documents and Documentation

Dick, David.  Justification for Documentation Testing April 2000, Usability Interface

Kaner, Cem and Pels, David. Improving User Documentation and Customer Care April 2000, Usability Interface

McDaniel, Scott.  Looking for Information about Usability Testing Documentation? April 2000, Usability Interface

Documentation Usability Techniques from the Usability Toolkit (DOC file)

Online Help

Parush, Avi and Parush, Debi K. Online Help - Too Much of a Good Thing? January 2001, Usability Interface

Ellison, Matthew. Secondary Windows in Online Help - What do Users Really Make of Them? January 2001, Usability Interface

Grayling, Trevor. If We Build it, Will They Come: A Usability Test of Two Browser-Based Embedded Help Systems. May 2002 Technical Communication, Volume 49, Number 2, p 193-209

Updated 6/13/2004