Just in case you’ve missed these, TechSmith are giving away free versions of their software. Admittedly they are older versions but you can upgrade them for less than the full price of the newer versions.

Obviously they are hoping people will try them and like them enough to pay for the latest version:

• Get SnagIt 7.25
• Get Camtasia Studio 3

TechSmith have another product, which will capture images and video as well; Jing is available for both Windows and OSX, but it seems to be primarily aimed at sharing the content online.

What I’d really like is Skitch for the PC.

As I mentioned previously, the opening presentation at TICAD was by Adobe and featured their vision of the future of Technical Communications and information development. Apparently that future includes video.

Video has been available to many for a few years now, yet it is never really the main focus of a documentation team. Tom has questioned this as well:

“For too long I’ve minimized the importance of the audiovisual. Captivate — the industry standard tool for creating screen demos — is actually a relatively simple application. Mastering it and integrating audiovisual into user help will take it to the next level.”

This echoes what Adobe suggest, no big surprise there, but I have to admit that I don’t fully agree.

As a quick learning tool, I’m sure videos (screen demos) are useful, but I wouldn’t really know as I’ve never used one as a primary source for learning about a product and I’m not sure I know anyone who has. Of course that’s not to say they don’t have value and with some research into the intended audience I’m sure it can be proven that they have a valid place in the product documentation set.

However my initial thoughts on the matter are hard to shake.

It may be one of the unwritten rules of documentation, the rules that few people question and may well be inaccurately applied, but I’ve always operated under the assumption that people only use the documentation when they are stuck.

Of course this is a broad sweeping statement but I believe that it is true for the majority of software users. So, if that is the case, what is their mindset when they finally give in (having asked a co-worker and searched Google to no avail) and fire up the online help or open the user guide? Typically they will be annoyed and want an answer or fix pretty damn sharpish.

Why, in that case, would they even consider sitting through a 2 minute video that explains how to use the functionality with which they are currently battling?

To be fair, Tom isn’t suggesting this approach but I think it’s wise to counsel against this trend lest it be used too heavily. A few short demos of how to complete core tasks, accompanied by a comprehensive help system or user guide is the best balance.

My fear is that the “cool” effect will override sensibilities and we’ll be plagued by popup videos and worse in the future.

The written word certainly isn’t the only way to effectively communicate information, and as technology progresses we will all need to carefully match the available delivery mechanisms with the information we need to deliver. The key word here is “carefully”.

I’d love to hear from anyone who is already doing something like this, I’ve not used Captivate, nor offered any form of video as part of a documentation set before as they didn’t match the audience profile but I’d be interested in hearing how successful they were.

Make my living writing software documentation. There is, of course, much more to it than that, but that remains the bulk of the job. I also write as a hobby, both on this blog and on my other more personal blog. I also maintain a third website although that has been somewhat neglected recently (note to self: get the finger out!).

Suffice to say I write a lot.

In addition to that I have also adopted what is increasingly known as ‘web worker’ tendencies. As I work with, and on, computers it is simple enough to switch between different tasks, and the web is a key part of that working practise.

And the key part of that practise, for me, is Google Docs. The ability to import and export to Word, to easily maintain the content in relevant folders, and of course the ability to access and edit the content from any PC… well it’s almost a no-brainer.

But one thing that I’ve recently found useful, is the ability to share the documents, allowing others to view and edit them. Admittedly it was only between two people, but if you have a small team, or are working on a project that spans the globe (something that is increasingly common these days) then it’s worth having a look at Google Docs.

Next week I’m heading down to Reading to attend the X-Pubs conference, where I’m hoping to learn more about both how a solid XML publishing solution is implemented and, ultimately, why I need to bother. OK, I know why I need to bother so I guess I should re-phrase that to “how I justify all the effort involved”.

I’ve done my fair share of research in the past, and have previously implemented an AuthorIT based solution. That worked reasonably well for our needs back then, but I’m with a different company now and the needs have, naturally, changed. I know all about the benefits of single sourcing content (re-use), and why XML is the best choice for storing that content (re-factorability, if that’s a word!) but as yet I’ve still not seen the killer product/solution that makes things:

1. easy to implement - I’ll accept some pain but most of the solutions I’ve seen have a fairly large knowledge mountain to climb
2. easy to adapt - I have, currently, very specific needs dictated both by the company and our product, and by my the needs of my team.

Of course no such solution exists, or we’d all be using it, right?

And that’s why I’m attending the X-Pubs conference.

I do believe that single sourcing is THE way to go about things in technical communications, almost (implementation costs aside) without reservation for any size of team and almost without regard for what they are producing. Like here in the UK, which is trapped between imperial and metric measurements, the technical communications industry seems to be a mix of differing output requirements. Some audiences demand printed manuals, some want websites full of searchable content, whilst others are happy with PDFs or online help. And that’s before we start worrying about localisation (localization).

I’m not entirely sure what I’ll discover at the conference, and I’m doing my best to keep an open mind, but I truly believe that the power of single sourcing will remain the refuge of the few until someone comes up with a workable, affordable solution that everyone can use.

I’ll be posting from the conference (possible even “live blogging”), so come back on the 4th June to find out what’s going on.

Do you single source? Or have you consider it in the past but never pursued it, and if so, why not?