SECTION E – USER GUIDE

Section E – Documentation: The User Guide (9 Marks)

 

A typical system will come with two pieces of documentation:

• Technical documentation

 

• A User Guide

Preparation

 

Read the notes below:

1.         Technical Documentation

Technical documentation is provided for the person who will administer your system when it is in place. (S)he will be responsible for ensuring that the system is maintained and/or updated if the organisation decides to extend the system. In order to do this (S)he will need to know about the structure of your system – how are tables related, which controls are dependent on others, how are controls formatted etc.

Your paperwork in the design and implementation sections covers this to a large degree and you can ignore this aspect of documentation.

2.         User Guide/Manual

The people who will be using your system on a day-to-day basis may need to be trained in its use or may encounter occasional problems. If your system is intuitive the user guide will be fairly short. It should include:
 

• A table of contents
• Introduction – what the system is about and who it is for;
• Modules – how to use each part of the system e.g. what do the various buttons on a form do?
• Special Considerations –  explain any special validation rules that might apply
• Error Messages – error messages that may be displayed and what to do in that event
• A help number or Email address

Paperwork

Your user guide should be aimed at an entirely non-technical user and where possible should use plain English rather than geek-speak. Presentation is very important, use screenshots rather than long descriptive lists. The user guide should be a separate document from your project paperwork.

• User Guide

 

Using the criteria outlined in the preparation section prepare a user guide for your project.