Thread: Feedback on the Nokia N900 User guides
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HSuhonen is offline HSuhonen
2010-01-15 , 13:12
Posts: 6 | Thanked: 51 times | Joined on Oct 2009 @ Finland
#13
Hi,

Thank you all for the feedback given so far. Here are some comments from me for some of the issues raised in this thread (I'll keep checking this thread anyway to gather all the feedback given):

Originally Posted by benny1967 View Post
Have translations checked. Nokia and translations don't go together well.
Other than that, I'm not sure. It would be cool if, say, somebody who recently got the device and remembers what wasn't clear to him in the beginning could check and tell you if this one topic is sufficiently explained in the manual - nice idea, but then it's too late. You should have your documentation ready before this user buys his device.
No, I really don't have a good idea here.
If you have any examples of the translation quality not being good enough in some products, please let me know and I'll forward your feedback to the localisation team. If you find language bugs in the N900 User guides, please report them in Bugzilla (grammatical errors etc.) Please do keep in mind that some language issues are matters of taste, so we should really focus on the language errors that really make it more difficult for the user to actually understand the instructions in the guide (such as wrong word choices).

As to writing the User guides, it's good to keep in mind that the User guides have to be ready well before the actual sales start, and this is what makes writing the guides particularly challenging. The content has to be translated and the guides printed and published, and so on, and this takes time.

Originally Posted by reviver View Post
Second is simply by reviewing manuals if they are made available before hand. It certainly isn't the strong point of most opensource communities, but you could give it a try
This is an idea that's well worth investigating. Of course, there are confidentiality issues when giving out material before the product is on sale but I'll keep this idea in mind and find out if something like this could be achieved.

Originally Posted by mysticrokks View Post
i think printed guides should die- its a waste of trees, lets be honest- you dont buy a phone like this and not know how to use google or use a pdf/html/whatever help. perhaps the phone should have an specific app pre installed that updates over interent with a help search.
The overall trend in recent years has been cutting down the number of pages in the printed guide, and as you say, it's more eco-friendly also. However, whether a printed guide is needed also depends on the local legislation in any given country, as well as the consumer protection laws that in many countries require a printed manual in the sales box.

Originally Posted by qole View Post
I think it would be amazing to have a way to link to a community-maintained wiki from the applications. That is, a help-key press launches the browser and takes the user to the maemo.org wiki page associated with that app.
This is a good idea. However, we need to keep in mind that the device is not intended for English-speaking users only, so the users whose native language is not English should be given the opportunity to get support primarily in their own language, in my opinion. So this aspect needs to be carefully thought, but I do see potential in your idea

Many of you have also brought up the idea of Nokia Wikis, and also having more content on the web and in-device (eg. tutorials, videos, web-browsable content). These are very good points, and I'll see what could be done to further extend the Nokia support offering.

Thank you!

Best regards,

Harri Suhonen
Nokia Care
 

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