[udig-devel] Re: Gettings Started (0.8 Feedback)

[Adrian Custer <acuster@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

hey,

        The user guide is avaialble here:
        http://jira.codehaus.org/browse/UDIGGuide
        The online help system is available from the application welcome page, 
        and includes a "Getting Started" tutorial that makes use of the included 
        shapfiles.
        
        Is this sufficient and did you discover it when you first started udig?
        

Yes, I saw the "Getting Started" Approach.

No, I don't think this is sufficient. 

The docs are not good for newbies. The 'first' doc is too complex and
the layout is attrocious. As I said in my post you want to teach the
user to do 4 things.
        >	1) Make a new project
        >	2) Make a new map
        >	3) Import data to the catalogue
        >	4) Add a layer to the map

The current setup makes a user wade through 4 different modes in 5 steps

1) launch eclipse                                 (commandline or gui)
2) click on "Getting Started"                     (w/in eclipse/Java)
=> opens the docs
3) Read tiny font, click on "Basic Tutorial"      (w/in an HTML page)
=> Here I've had to read a slew of info that's slowing me down.
4) click on "The workbench"
=> Where do we click next?              (need to *use* the help system)
	A) The back button.
		=> Are you really going to ask user to bounce in and out of every
subtopic?

	B) Open the layout of the docs on the left
		=> Navigating the tree by mouse, well undestood but not elegant, and
the user has to figure out that that pane is a tree.


There are two eventual solutions:	
	1) you make a big, single 'getting started' HTML page with no frames,
no nothing, just one big scrollbar. The more sophisticated help system
is another step.
	2) you create a "cheat sheet" which you can even script to have little
buttons to actually do each step for the user! It works w/in eclipse so
we aren't jumping into the docs, it is designed for the purpose, and it
worked well for me while learning the ide. Not that I'd suggest making a
big use of it. It's not a good format for conceptual ideas, or for
reference info. That's what the doc subsystem is for.

I'm not saying this needs to be done right away but certainly before you
deploy this widely, for your own sake.

--adrian