Technology independent techniques for GL 3.1 L3 SC4

Diane Stottlemyer and I have been working on the technology 
independent techniques for GL 3.1 L3 SC4, Section Titles are 
Descriptive. The following techniques have been distilled from the 
references at the bottom of the message. All would need to be 
satisfied.

Loretta

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1. Help users find the information they are looking for. Write section 
titles that are meaningful and will help users scan documents quickly 
and easily. To speed scanning, help users quickly tell when sections 
don't contain what they are looking for.

2. Write section titles that clearly indicate the topic of their 
section. Each section should only cover one specific idea.

3. The first section title should let the user know why the page or 
document is important.  

4. Users should be able to get a summary or overview of the content by 
skimming just the section titles. Make the structure clear and obvious.

5. Subsections of a section should provide more detailed explanation 
of the section. Sections at the same level of the hierarchy should be 
in order of importance.

6. A title should make sense when viewed completely out of context.

7. Make titles as concise, distinct and relevant as possible, to 
assist scanning. Section titles should be short, clear, concise and to 
the point. Use sentence fragments.

8. Use simple words that are descriptive, and avoid jargon.

9. Start section titles with key words that distinguish them from 
other section titles and are unique. It is hard to scan titles that 
start with the same word or phrase.


References to additional information:
http://redish.net/content/papers/interactions.html
http://www.usability.gov/methods/collecting_writing.html
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/9710a.html
http://www.useit.com/papers/webwriting/rewriting.html

Received on Tuesday, 13 September 2005 00:21:47 UTC