SMILE Tutorial Feedback (Incomplete)

[personitis]

So, I found one of my tutorials for SMILE I was typing up lying around my documents folder the other night and I want some serious feedback on it.

• Too wordy?
• Descriptive enough?
• Do you think it's going in the right direction?
• Should I even take the time to finish this?
• Any comments you have yourself?

You can find the .pdf below. If you're a even a slow reader, it shouldn't take more than 10 minutes to read, given it's incomplete state.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/31435028/smile_tutorial.pdf
Thanks for your time. :wink:

[Quietus]

There are quite a few spelling / grammar issues, but, as with all word processing, they should be fixed once you're preparing to finish it up and release it.

A few obvious things, however:

It's 'Foreword', not 'Forward' (very beginning) and 'without further ado', not 'without further adieu' (just before the table of contents).  Both are common errors. :^_^:
The 'check boxes' you mention are usually referred to as radio buttons.  Sometimes option buttons too.
Before mentioning any interaction with the main SMILE view, you should really mention about just opening up a room.  I know that Jathys added a small tweak to make the drop-down box flash, as so many people missed it before, but it can't hurt to point out the obvious before getting into tile selection / placement.

On a more general note, I think it would be better to have much clearer splits between sections, and largely more pictures.  The phrase 'a picture is worth a thousand words' is very true when it comes to guides / tutorials.

[Cadarot]

One thing personally I would change other than grammatical errors, is the way the table of content is laid out.
I would do it more in a format of...



Basics and need to knows

• 1.0 - Hexadecimal - What the hex is that?
• 1.1 - Binary - Weaving 1s and 0s



S.M.I.L.E. - Super Metroid Integrated Level Editor


• 1.0 - S.M.I.L.E. - Wait, what?
• 1.1 - S.M.I.L.E. interface
• 1.2 - BTS


That's just me though.
and not having a 1, then 1.1, etc.

[silverpaw84]

[snip]

[begrimed]

I skimmed over the original txt version you posted awhile ago. Been reworking the document section entirely and noticed there's no real definitive SMILE guide. Just smaller collections of info out there like your guide, MoonEdit and BlackTelomeres' SMILE FAQ page. What I'll most likely do is gather everything from all three documents that isn't repeated between them and make a single webpage from those with pictures and stuff where needed. This means definitely do continue your good work on the guide. I can't really think of any specific improvements that haven't already been noted, besides just taking your time to explain every little thing about SMILE you can find in that document of yours. Everything. Not needed, but writing down any deviations between different versions of SMILE would be really rad.

[silverpaw84]

Since Grime said to add even the small stuff:
one very small tidbit that I recently discovered by accident: if you hold the "=" key while dragging over tiles, the type of the first tile is copied, so you can easily make a long line of solid/bomb/grapple/etc. blocks quickly. It doesn't work for slopes, they just become a generic slope. I haven't read that anywhere, and it is an HUGE time saver, seeing as how when you make your own GFX set, everything is air

[begrimed]

Silverpaw: Something else you might not have known, on that note. If you double-click on a tile from the tileset (not in the room itself), a little window comes up that lets you set a default BTS type. This fixes little quirks like certain tiles being slopes by default and displaying red BTS numbers when you change them to a solid or something else. Never knew about the = shortcut though, nice.

[silverpaw84]

[snip]

[Lunaria]

From what I read, there is too much fluff in the document so far. I know it's a tutorial and not a documentation, but more straight to the point would be nice. If everything about SMILE will be covered in this way then the document will be super long and new people would just skip it and ask questions instead. As in, people who would normally read it; there will always be people who don't read at all and just asks anyway...

[personitis]

[spoiler=My responses to quotes.]

One thing personally I would change other than grammatical errors, is the way the table of content is laid out.

That would make the ToC flow much better seeing as how '1.' is not even a section that has text but rather more of a "New Chapter" mark.

If you want, you can throw in my BTS guide, parts of it, or rewrite, don't worry about credit, it's basic stuff. I don't think anybody else took the time to research each BTS slope so it might help.

Thanks. I'll rewrite it and still give you credit. After all, saves me from having to fiddle with a few things.

What I'll most likely do is gather everything from all three documents that isn't repeated between them and make a single webpage from those with pictures and stuff where needed. This means definitely do continue your good work on the guide.

I actually had a webpage going for sometime, but then kinda just stopped. If there's anything you want to collaborate on, I'm open to it.

From what I read, there is too much fluff in the document so far. I know it's a tutorial and not a documentation, but more straight to the point would be nice. If everything about SMILE will be covered in this way then the document will be super long and new people would just skip it and ask questions instead. As in, people who would normally read it; there will always be people who don't read at all and just asks anyway...

On a more general note, I think it would be better to have much clearer splits between sections, and largely more pictures.  The phrase 'a picture is worth a thousand words' is very true when it comes to guides / tutorials.

This is why I asked my first two questions, these two comments right here. I agree it is rather fluffy (:3) and it would help to include more pictures.[/spoiler]

Thanks for the feedback everyone. What I'll end up doing is revising the beginning and taking into account what you all have said. I'll most likely end up posting the guide as it builds, that way I can edit things as I go and as people find them instead of making one huge review session (in addition to a few other bonuses to this method). In the end, if anyone wants to volunteer themselves to help me proof-read it'd be much appreciated.

[Mon732]

A little addition for your tutorial.
In smile if you hold down the middle mouse button then you can scroll around the level by moving the mouse.

The tutorial is looking great so far!

[Quietus]

I never actually knew that. :lol:

Perhaps an unintended extra from this may well be to get a comprehensive list of controls and shortcut keys for SMILE?

[silverpaw84]

[snip]