Abstract
The author discusses the results of a mail survey of 42 software-manual writers, editors, and their managers residing in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area. The survey analyzed the concept of task orientation in computer manuals. Analysis of the survey led to the following conclusions: software-manual writers, editors, and their managers overwhelmingly think task orientation is the best way to organize manuals. The type of manual you write (system or application) or the size of computer you write for does not influence the effectiveness of task orientation. When a writer organizes a manual by tasks, he or she most often uses an organizational strategy, where each major tasks is described in a chapter. Finally, respondents described problems encountered when writing task-oriented manuals, and techniques used to write effective task-oriented manuals.