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On Dec 22, 2004, at 5:55 PM, Gordon Webster wrote:
We should concede them a minor point about the rev documentation though. Yes, all the info is there - somewhere - but it's arranged more like a jigsaw puzzle than a book and when I'm trying to learn a new programming language, a book is a whole lot easier.
I like the way you put this. Yes, a jigsaw puzzle is about right. The arrangement of the Rev docs makes for a great reference for people who already know exactly what they are looking for, or are at least familiar enough to have a grasp on the terminology. They make for a rather pathetic learning tool if you are not already familiar with Rev, or at least with HyperCard or something quite similar.
What is really needed is a Tutorial, which actively walks new users through their first few projects. Not the video things on RevOnline (though they are definitely a step in the right direction), but more like the "wizard"/"assistant" type interfaces used in some software: Step 1: this is what we are about to do (click next), Step 2: do this, then this, here is why, then click next, ...
Anyone remember the Apple Guide? Those nice red circles that pointed you visually to exactly what the help text was referring to? Or how about the fact that if you missed a step, the Apple Guide detected that and actually helped you to do it, pointing out in the meantime exactly what you missed?
(Anyone have a clue why this was left out of OS X? I think it was one of the best online help systems ever created!)
There should be an "orientation" tutorial which walks new users through the very basics of working with Rev and rudimentary scripting (on mouseUp go to next card end mouseUp), and a series of similar tutorials for advanced topics, such as one on inheritance, one on chunk expressions, one on the geometry manager, one (actually several) on database access, etc.
These tutorials need to cover the topics fairly thoroughly.
In addition to the tutorials, it would be good for Rev to beef up the "Topics" section of the documentation to include virtually all features of Transcript. The "Topics" section would act as a good complement to the tutorials, to help users fill in the blanks after completing a tutorial. There should probably be a one-to-one correspondence between tutorial categories and topics categories: for each tutorial or series of tutorials, more documentation can be found in the "Topics" category with the same name.
All that said, IMHO rev wins hand down!
So true.
- ----------------------------------------------------------- Frank D. Engel, Jr. <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
$ ln -s /usr/share/kjvbible /usr/manual
$ true | cat /usr/manual | grep "John 3:16"
John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
$
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