1.1 Issue of Media

Concerning the media issue, the most commonly used media to express manuals are paper and digital.

Both of these two media, however, have weaknesses. Printing manuals on paper is a traditional approach. All required information should be searched manually. Thus the organization of information is more significant than the content of information when we consider whether the design of a paper manual is good or not. Moreover, hampered by the printing quality and the physical limitation of the paper, a paper manual is visually less expressive and attractive. An online manual seems to be able to solve the problem of information searching and visual expression. Its electronic format brings interactions. Information can be searched and displayed very quickly according to the input of the users. Colorful images and live movies can be used to express the operating steps which can impress the users. Electronic manuals, however, face many challenges.