Short Report | Analysis of iFixit Instructions

For the past nine weeks, you have read extensively about the basic principles of instructions writing. You have also written a set of instructions and received feedback. Based on what you have learned, you need to do the following:

• Assess the effectiveness of the iFixit instructions
• Recommend appropriate changes (if necessary) to iFixit
• Justify your recommendations based on your assessment and reference to your text, your user experience, and class notes

To complete this assignment you must

• Create a list of criteria for assessing the instructions
• Apply those criteria to each instructional module: Fast Start: Overview | CHECKPOINT 1 | CHECKPOINT 2
• Analyze the data
• Write the report

Let’s look at each step more closely.

Create a list of criteria for assessing the instructions

The best way to assess a set of instructions is by attempting to follow those instructions. For the past three weeks, you have been trying to follow the iFixit instructions for the Fast Fix project. You should look at the content of each, but assess each module consistently using the same criteria. I recommend you refer to the following chapters in your text when creating your list of criteria:

Chapter 2 | Structure and Organization

Chapter 3 | Standard Content

Chapter 4 | Layout and Design

Chapter 5 | Methods of Presentation

Chapter 6 | Writing Style

Before you start, let’s look at an example:

Example 1 | Finding an Apartment

You are ready to move into a new apartment, and you’re trying to decide which one is best for you. Denton has thousands of apartments, so how do you decide? The smart thing to do is decide what you need, so you can eliminate the apartments that don’t fit your criteria:

Apply those criteria to each instructional module: Fast Start: Overview | CHECKPOINT 1 | CHECKPOINT 2

Once you create your criteria, you have to apply it. Let’s look at our example again.

Now you can put each apartment in your table, and quickly decide which don’t fit your baseline criteria. Let’s say you end up with 5 options. Your table might look like this:

Great. This is a good start, but let’s make it even better. Let’s give a score for each category:

5-1 | 5 is the lowest price and 1 is the highest

5-1 | 5 is the closest and 1 is the farthest

2-1 | 2 for 2 bedrooms

2-1 | 2 for 2 bathroom and 1 for 1

Now our table looks like this:

Now you can easily see that your final two options are Dog Wood and Red Bud because they have the highest scores. Now you’re ready for the next step.

After reviewing each chapter, and possibly the PowerPoints that I provided, what criteria have you developed? What would your table look like?

Analyze the data

Once your tables are filled out and you have data, you can begin to analyze. What story does the data tell? Where do the instructions succeed? Where do they fail? What changes do they indicate iFixit needs to make?