Technical Translation: Usability Strategies for Translating Technical Documentation

Expert:
Documents for this audience should use specialised vocabulary and 
accepted methodology. 
User:
Documents for users should present descriptive procedures clearly 
and they should also use a simple vocabulary. 
Technician:
Graphics should be used frequently and the guide should not 
be perfect bound (presumably so that document can be opened flat on a ta-
ble). 
Technical Expert:
This readership requires quantitative information to be 
placed first in the document. 
Generic User:
Needs abstracts, overviews and summaries to make reading 
easier. Information should be structured from general-to-specific or most 
important-to-least important. 
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Software User Guides
Multiple Audiences:
Documents produced for multiple audiences should 
have information layered within sections. 
Software User Guides 
Mobile phones, video games, digital cameras, MP3 players, word processing 
software, televisions, x-ray machines, satellite navigation systems, DVD 
players and industrial process control systems. A reliance on semi-
conductors notwithstanding, a common theme linking this diverse range of 
products is that they are all accompanied by some sort of user guide. More 
specifically, they invariably include a software user guide. 
A common misconception about software user guides is that they are 
written only by software companies for software products. In reality, how-
ever, any company that produces software - even if it is only as a supple-
ment to the company’s main product - will produce software user guides 
(Van Laan & Julian 2001:4). 
Despite the wide-scale production of user guides, especially in the soft-
ware and technology industries, it appears quantity has not translated into 
quality. Indeed, poor or inadequate user guides are a widely acknowledged 
problem in industry (Brockman 1990:1). That there exists such inadequate 
documentation is disturbing, especially when we consider that aside from 
certain legal implications, the quality of user guides can spell success or fail-
ure for a product or even for a company. One such documented example 
refers to the catastrophic losses incurred in 1983 by a company called 
Coleco. This company lost a staggering US$45 million in the final three 
months of 1983 as thousands of irate customers returned the Coleco Adam 
computer, citing the terrible user guide as the problem (Brockman 
1990:13). Stories like this are numerous and it is clear that user guides can 
help improve sales and create loyal customers (as was the case with Apple 
computers in the 1970s and 1980s). 
But high quality user guides are not just useful ways of gaining new cus-
tomers. As products become more and more sophisticated and complex, it 
is essential that quality user documentation is available to help users exploit 
the full range of functions offered by the product. Companies frequently 
spend vast sums of money on products of which only a fraction of the func-
tions will ever be used. 
It is possible that the problems of poor documentation are due to the 
simple fact that companies do not always understand the purpose of user 
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Technical Communication 
guides and those who produce them, not to mention the needs of the cus-
tomers who use the user guides. 
User guides are, in effect, an interface between computer systems and 
their human users. In producing user guides, technical communicators need 
to act as an intermediary between the software and the users. To be suc-
cessful in producing user guides, it is essential not only to understand the 
product in detail, but also to understand the humans who will use it. Coe 
(1996:2) states that technical communicators design information for users 
and there is “a covenant of trust” between communicator and user. This, 
she maintains, is the basis for human factors in user documentation. 
Admittedly, in recent years, the quality of user guides has improved 
steadily. Yet there are huge numbers of people who simply do not read user 
guides no matter how complex the products they want to use. In fact, it 
seems that sometimes the more complex the product, the less likely some 
people will be to read the user guide. While we can attribute this to an ex-
pectation by users that modern products are generally intuitive and self-
explanatory, it is more likely that we are dealing with people who Coe 
claims have “lost their trust of technical communications” (1996:3). For 
them, “past experiences may have destroyed their trust and colored their 
approach to and use of” technical information presented in, for example, 
user guides (
ibid.
). 
Here, the problem facing user guides is more serious and more difficult 
than simply teaching users how to use a product. Rather, the task is to re-
establish contact and trust with users and persuade them to read and trust 
user guides. These users frequently have just reason to be wary of user 
guides because previous experiences have left them feeling frustrated, con-
fused or just plain stupid. An interesting discussion of this issue is provided 
by Schriver (1997:214-222) who cites feelings of confusion and incompe-
tence among users as a result of inadequate instructions. Interestingly, users 
generally blame themselves for their inability to follow instructions for 
products (
ibid
:222). 
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What is a User Guide?