Nanomentoring: Investigating How Quickly People Can Help People Learn Feature-Rich Software
Ian Drosos, Jo Vermeulen, George Fitzmaurice, Justin Matejka
TLDR
This paper explores "nanomentoring," finding that experts can provide helpful answers to simple software questions in under a minute.
Key contributions
- Defined "nanoquestions" as software queries answerable in under one minute.
- Found experts could answer over half of these nanoquestions helpfully in <60 seconds.
- Investigated expert preferences for text vs. audio responses.
- Gathered insights to design tools for ultra-rapid human help.
Why it matters
This research highlights the feasibility of ultra-rapid human-to-human help for software users, addressing long wait times in traditional forums. It provides a foundation for designing new support tools that leverage expert knowledge more efficiently, improving user experience.
Original Abstract
People frequently use online forums to get help from experts to answer questions about feature-rich software. However, they may have to wait minutes, hours, or even days to receive advice. We investigate the potential to leverage experts to provide quicker help. We collected over 200 questions from online forums for two feature-rich software applications and suspected a quarter were short enough to be answered in less than one minute (defined as nanoquestions). We then conducted a study with 28 experts recruited from help forums to confirm this assumption, and explore whether there was a preference between text and audio answers. For more than half of the nanoquestions participants saw, they could give advice that they believed was helpful in under 60 seconds. Finally, we collected feedback about what makes a question quick to answer to inspire the design of future tools for ultra rapid human-to-human help.
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