UNIX HELP FOR USERS Edinburgh Univ Bob McGonigle The Unix operating system is rapidly establishing itself as the major operating system on higher education campuses: it is used increasingly both by university mainframe systems and by distributed networks of workstations. Unix is powerful, offering immense opportunities to users to tailor the system to their particular needs, but it is difficult to learn. The Unix Help Project will develop entry level tools for new users of Unix who want to use the operating system with the minimum of learning investment, for example in order to use email, to transfer files or to run a program. The main product of the project will be a user-oriented online help system for Unix. The aim is to produce an easy-to-use, task-driven, problem-solving online help system, to complement the comprehensive 'manual' pages which are already available. Paper documentation for beginners, including introductory guides, reference cards and posters, will be produced. Self-study materials will also be developed. The use of hypertext software, such as 'Guide', to create effective online help and self-study materials will be investigated. This is a three-year project based in The Computing Service, The University of Edinburgh. _______________________________________________________________________ | | | In general the copyright for material on the NISS Bulletin Board | | is held by the CHEST & NISS Centre (University of Bath) or by the | | authors. | | | | Copying or reproduction of the material is permitted provided that | | | | (a) the source is acknowledged | | and (b) the material is not used for commercial gain. | | | | However, material must not be made available outside the academic | | community without prior consent. | |_______________________________________________________________________|