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The True Image documentation is good. It could be better.

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I'm a retired EE / programmer / technical writer. I have a selfish interest in the quality of user documentation.

Most user documentation is terrible. The True Image documentation is surprisingly good. Whoever wrote it understands the basics of user documentation. It starts from the simple and proceeds to the more-complex. And it's task-oriented, with plenty of examples.

But...

Though the author understands English well, he or she doesn't have a perfect grasp of it. There are some odd word choices and weird usage. More importantly, the material is somewhat over-written, with excessive repetition. It could be terser and gain clarity.

The woman who said she was worried about her ability to use the software suggests that the documentation -- as good as it is -- is not addressing her need for hand-holding. There's nothing wrong with holding the user's hand. If users knew how to use the product, they wouldn't need to read the manual!

A company once passed e-mails to me from happy customers. One said that my writing sounded as if I were talking directly to him. (Ken Kessler from Hi-Fi News & Record Review said the same thing.) Another said that she'd had trouble with software, but she followed my directions and it worked.

This was no accident. I write instructions so that blindly following them will always work. More importantly, I make sure the reader understands the context of what's being done. The most-imporant function of documentation is to make sure the user never has a reason to contact the manufacturer.

The True Image manual needs a careful edit. I hope Acronis management will contact me about this.

Comments are welcome.

0 Users found this helpful

Hi William,

Good feedback.  I would suggest copying your writeup and submitting directly to Acronis using the in-app feedback function of the application so it gets to the developers directly as this is the user forum and mostly just us users in here.  The feedback tool is the best way to provide suggestions, feedback, etc. directly to Acronis.

FYI, some of the MVP's have started our own documentation on Google Drive:  https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B8uZDIFmupY7X01OQ1NqY0VWa2M

A collection of user tutorial videos:  https://forum.acronis.com/forum/117004

and there are also the KB Articles that provide some more step-by-step help in some situations.  https://kb.acronis.com/

There are places to grab some other info, but it is sometimes spread around if you're not really sure to look.  Those of us with MVP badges are volunteers and try to answer posts and point others in the right direction as well.  

 

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Posts: 250
Comments: 7092

Hello William,

We've found your feedback in our internal ticket system and forwarded it to the product management.
Thank you for your attention to our userguide!