Re: InfoD-Cafe: Collection of illustrated Manuals
Jose de Souza <marconi2006 <at> googlemail.com>
2007-03-01 10:31:51 GMT
The concept of "well designed" products it is a subject that may take
long hours of discussion, which very often it finishes (or starts) by
people agreeing to disagree.
Anyway, I will not escape from this question. In my humble opinnion,
"well designed" instructions means that a good compromise between
instructional effectiveness requirements (e.g. Have I been clearly
taught what I am suposed to learn?) and aesthetic satisfaction (e.g.
have I been visually persuaded to learn what I am suposed to learn?)
has been achieved in the product form. I admit that this sounds
rather simplistic. But, if you want to get deeper Patricia Wright's
paper "Criteria and ingredients for successful patient information "
indicates that, in order to deliver the message efficiently,
instructions should be readable, usable and, lets not forget,
likeable. I see this approach as rather platonic, however it
motivates me as professional.
By the way an beautiful example of Needlework manual is the
"Encyclopedia of Needlework" by Therese de Dillmont (c.a. 1900).
José.
> The gardening books written by D. G. Hessayon, the 'Expert' series.
> These are relatively inexpensive and very popular books that continue
> to sell well despite (mostly) being over 10 years old. They do raise
> an interesting question which is: what do we mean by 'well designed'?
> Hessayon's books strike me as somewhat ugly but they are clearly
> effective.
--
de Souza
PhD Student
Department of Typography & Graphic Communication
The University of Reading
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That article is dated February 11, 2005, and the Gootube deal was October 10, 2006. Perhaps dates are often lower in the visual hierarchy of websites than they should be
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