Comments on: How to Create a Great Tutorial on Anything at All

By: catalin

catalin — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 19:53:08 +0000

I love your article and all the steps you explained. This is something that most of manufacturers should take example of. I remember when I bought some furniture and it took me 2 days to assemble it based on the drawings and I still wasn’t able to perfectly assemble one piece because it was badly designed.

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By: IgorHelpsYouSucceed

IgorHelpsYouSucceed — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 20:08:55 +0000

As a frequent tutorial seeker I resonate with the fact that when you’re desperate you’re looking for a tutorial or a forum discussion.

Somehow, getting that quick fix makes you feel safe…

Great article, loved it.

Igor
IgorHelpsYouSucceed´s last blog ..Webmaster Tools Onslaught: Bing vs Google vs Yahoo

By: Allison Day

Allison Day — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 09:02:47 +0000

Yes, yes, oh my goodness yes. Every single programmer who ever writes a tutorial needs to read this (I only mention programmers because those are the tutorials I generally tend to read). Far too often, I find myself giving up on tutorials because they’re so difficult to read and understand, for the reasons you’ve listed.

So many of them make huge assumptions about the knowledge of their readers. Since I’m a self taught programmer, and therefore don’t have the basic knowledge that most university-taught programmers have, it’s endlessly frustrating to have to stop every minute and go look up what this acronym, or that programming term means. Even if you don’t want to completely dumb down your tutorial for the least knowledgeable of your audience (especially if you expect to attract people who are already somewhat trained in the subject), I still think you should show the tutorial to someone completely outside of the field and then include links that explain any terms, etc. that aren’t familiar to them.

Then they don’t correct spelling, grammar, don’t check to see if their code compiles correctly… *sigh* And so many don’t have a good grasp of the language they’re writing in… of course I understand that many, many programmers (or anyone else who would write any sort of tutorial) don’t speak English as their first language, but I think if you’re going to write any sort of tutorial in a language that’s not your first language, you need to have it looked over by someone who does speak the language well before you publish it. (I know I certainly would if I ever wrote a tutorial in Japanese, for example!)

Okay, rant over. But seriously, I may be passing this post around. I can think of quite a few people (some of whom I know personally) who need to take this advice to heart.
Allison Day´s last blog ..Red Dragon Roll

By: Frank Lynch

Frank Lynch — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 05:20:22 +0000

True! There are so many qaucks online trying to teach this and that thinking that they know it all,but your post is a real eye opener to them. Teaching is the noblest form of profession imparting knowledge is the knowledge gain! we should look inside ourselves whether we are fully equipped for this job or not.But then again there are so many good and thorough tutorials are also available online and i have happen to read them and yes they have been very useful to me but i also agree that all these tutorial weer in sync with the tips you have mentioned in your post.