ubuntu-phone team mailing list archive

[Matthew Paul Thomas <mpt@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

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Daniel Holbach wrote on 20/05/15 08:45:
> ...
> 
> great work as always. I just wrote a blog entry to summarise the 
> feedback we received so far:
> 
> https://daniel.holba.ch/blog/2015/05/more-help-app-design-ponderings/
>
> 
Does anyone have more ideas on what we could do with the help app?
> Would anyone like to get involved?
> 
> ...

Ubuntu for PC also has a help function. As the platforms converge,
their help systems should converge too. So it's probably a good idea
to start liaising with the Documentation Team.
<https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DocumentationTeam>

This is important not just for convergence, but also because many of
the weak points with the current Help app are similar to problems that
Ubuntu help had on the PC ten years ago.
<https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HelpfulHelp?action=recall&rev=28> The
Documentation Team could help you write and organize the help.

Meanwhile:

"Help" is a bit vague as the name for an app that isn't installed by
default. Either get it installed by default (this is not an
endorsement, just a possibility), or name it more specifically,
"Ubuntu Help". Also tidy the description: "help for your Ubuntu device
experience" would be less fluffy as "help with your Ubuntu phone".

In the app itself, the front page currently consists entirely of this
text:

    The world-wide Ubuntu community wants to give you the best
    possible experience on your Ubuntu device. This is why we
    collected:

    *   Answers to frequently asked questions

    *   Tips and tricks to make you more productive

    *   Links to get in touch with experts and other community members

This is telling you that it's going to help you. But it's not helping
you. Compare with the help for Ubuntu for PC, or Windows, or OS X:
their front pages immediately provide links to actual help topics.

To find the help topics in this app, you need to use a hamburger menu.
Hamburger menus are best avoided, for a variety of reasons.
<https://lmjabreu.com/post/why-and-how-to-avoid-hamburger-menus/>
<http://techcrunch.com/2014/05/24/before-the-hamburger-button-kills-you/>
<http://blog.manbolo.com/2014/06/30/apple-on-hamburger-menus>

For example, in landscape mode on a BQ Aquaris E4.5, I can get to only
the first five help topics; the rest are completely inaccessible. And
because the menu limits you to a single level of hierarchy, most of
the help screens are very long and cover multiple topics, making
individual topics harder to find. Use pages of links instead.

After that "Welcome", the first topic is called "Basic tasks". Put
yourself in the shoes of someone using this app. They're already upset
that they had to go to a help function at all to find out how to do
something. And now you are unintentionally insulting them by calling
the task "Basic". This is easily avoided.

"User Interface" is not useful as a category for a similar reason:
people won't be able to guess whether you thought a topic was "User
Interface" or not. For example, why is typing emoji "User Interface",
while changing the user interface language is not? Why is taking a
picture under "Apps", while finding that very same picture is under
"User Interface"?

Both problems can be solved by categorizing help by overall function,
rather than by user level or interface component. For example,
"Finding apps", "Typing and editing text", "Photos and videos", or
"Customizing your phone". Occasionally a page may belong in two
categories; that's okay, put it in both. As a last resort, use
card-sorting to choose appropriate categories.
<http://www.usability.gov/how-to-and-tools/methods/card-sorting.html>

Including screenshots, static or animated, can be effective. But you
need to be really careful in how you do it. For example, when I'm
reading the help in English, the "How do I set the time / language?"
animation appears in Catalan, which is not so helpful. In 2007 I wrote
guidelines on how to use screenshots in PC help, and most of them
apply just as much to a phone.
<https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuHelp/UsingScreenshots?action=recall&rev=7>

Avoid using technical terms, that aren't already in the UI, when you
don't need to. For example, "dialer", "indicators", "infographic",
"disable", or "default messaging application" (you mean "the Messaging
app"). Introducing new terms increases cognitive load.

Finally, copyedit zealously. Every time someone sees a typo like
"let's you", "Learn wow to", "is activated it", or "It hows" -- or
even a miscapitalization, like "youtube", "the gallery app", or
"Security and privacy" -- they'll trust the help a little less. And
every time someone reads fluff like "in question", "Give it a try!",
or "back and forth", they'll get a little less patient with it too.

(Since I've said that, according to Muphry's Law, this message
probably will have a typo in it somewhere.)

Sam Bull wrote on 22/05/15 13:27:
> ...
> 
> Personally, I'd like to see something that facilitates bug 
> reporting. Specifically, I would like it to help the user work out 
> which components to register bugs. Also, if it can open a link 
> directly to the report bug page, with the user already logged in 
> (using the credentials from online accounts) that would be 
> excellent.
> 
> ...

I think people who install a "Help" app are about as likely to write
effective bug reports as users in general are -- that is, not likely
at all. (And that's not even counting their reaction to the
bewildering Launchpad notifications they receive for months or years
afterward.)

I suggest instead that UI for reporting bugs be combined into an app
for contributing to Ubuntu generally, so that people first need to
express interest in contributing by installing that app.
<https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ContributorConsole>

- -- 
mpt
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