How useful is your documentation really?

Usability testing provides insights into how our users interact with or think about a product. It helps us to test not only our devices but also our documentation. Here are some examples of and tips on how you can test and ensure the usability of your documentation.

Text by Dimiter Simov

Inhaltsübersicht

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Let’s start with a definition. For the purpose of this article “usability” is

a quality of a thing that shows how fit, convenient, and easy to learn and use it is for particular people in a particular context for a particular task.

People, context, and task are critical and need to be clearly defined. These parameters can, for example, include documentation as an aid that people use to accomplish their task. Usability testing thus also helps us to measure the usability of the documentation.  

We can measure usability by asking experts to review the product against certain criteria or by testing it with users. In this article, we take a look at usability testing as a way to evaluate, with the help of users, how usable something is.

The results of a usability test can assure you that you are on the right track or, rather, that you are headed in the wrong direction and need to correct ...