Tim,
I'm not sure that your analogy holds water. Those that began using computers
back in the DOS days have been in the game for quite a few years and are
basically computer savvy people who tend to be able to solve their own
problems. Heck you had to be able to solve problems in order to install and
run DOS. Remember your first computer? You anxiously plugged in a floppy
disk, turned it on and watched it churn while you anxiously waited for this
magic computer to spring to life, and what did it do when if finally got
done churning?
"A:\"
And it was up to you to figure out what to do from there!!!
The other group, many of them new Writelog users, just brought their machine
home from Wal-Mart yesterday and have barely figured out where the on/off
switch is, let alone how to set up and configure a complex program such as
Writelog. I'm not saying that the program and/or the documentation can't be
improved, it certainly can be, but it's not entirely at fault :-)
----
73, Rich - W3ZJ
> -----Original Message-----
> From: writelog-admin@contesting.com
> [mailto:writelog-admin@contesting.com]On Behalf Of Tim Makins, EI8IC
> Sent: Wednesday, November 28, 2001 6:46 AM
> To: WA9ALS - John; WriteLog@contesting.com
> Subject: Re: [WriteLog] Curious?? (long)
>
>
> Hi John - I lurk on this reflector, because I'm interested in how Writelog
> works with SO2R. I also lurk on the reflectors for CT, NA, TR, and SD. You
> might be interested to know that the Writelog reflector generates 3 or 4
> times as much email as any of the others, mainly of people asking
> for help.
> On that basis alone, I would say that assuming the program is not full of
> bugs, then the documentation MUST be. If people have problems, then either
> the program is not simple enough to use, or the Help guide does
> not explain
> itself well enough, or the documentation is inadequate. The usual problem
> here is that the documentation is written by the author, who
> forgets that he
> knows half the stuff, and assumes his readers will as well. I
> have seen this
> frequently in a number of major software packages. I am sure you have too.
>
> If it is the only Windows contesting program of its kind, then that's a
> pity, because there's no incentive to make things work better. At
> the end of
> the day, software should be there to assist us, not make us pull our hair
> out, as many of the correspondents seem to be doing. Things have moved on
> from the days of the '386, and we've all got Megabytes of memory available
> that should be used to help the user. Doesn't seem to be happening here,
> does it ?
>
> If I was a prospective purchaser of Writelog, and lurked on the reflector
> for a while, I would be scared silly by the correspondence, and would NOT
> buy the program.
>
> In my book, a good program has a silent reflector. End of story.
>
> Tim, EI8IC
> www.qsl.net/ei8ic/
> The European HF Contesting Website
> Recent winner of the 'DX Zone' Editors choice Award.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "WA9ALS - John" <wa9als@starband.net>
> To: "Jerry Ford" <benlightnd13@home.com>; <WriteLog@contesting.com>
> Sent: 28 November 2001 10:23
> Subject: Re: [WriteLog] Curious?? (long)
>
>
> > (I'm sending this to the reflector in case there are other friendly
> > undecided lurkers out there like Jerry.
>
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>
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