Is the Kronos Manual Fit for use?

[lotty1]

Hi Is the Operation Guide / Parameter guide easy to use? I have struggled and struggled with them. Vertical columns are not the easiest way to read instruction on a pc screen. That’s if you can find the instruction hidden in the text.
Would it be possible for someone to setup a voting system on the forum please?
The purpose of this would be to put a little bit of pressure on korg to create a user manuals with clear instruction on how to use a Kronos to it full potential.
This is just my view.
What do you think

[BobTheDog]

Well the manuals are pretty good if you need to know something in particular.

I think the main problem s that the Kronos is quite a complex beast, I could imagine I would be quite hard to write an engaging/interesting/simple manual for it.

Overall though I think they are pretty good but then I read a lot of technical documents in my work.

[jimknopf]

Manual and parameter guide are very well written, if you consider the complexity of the Kronos OS. As a reference and source of information both are great. I don't see much to change about them besides some details. the operation manual helps to get a first overview over the whole system, and the paranter guide delivers full information. But both are no practical task guides in the sense I mean.

What always helps a lot from user perspective IMHO are "How-To" guides (written or video), giving a step by step introduction how to get something concrete done, across manual chapters and Kronos modes, from a practical user perspective. These guides are no alternative for manual and parameter guide. They just provide the same kind of information from a pure task oriented user perspective, even if that includes redundant information.

From my view it is impossible to write a guide about any complex matter, which is a reference and a practical user guide at the same time. It means looking at the same matter from really different perspectives, and it is better to take each perspective serious, than to hope that the other perspective is somehow included (and vice versa).

So what would help is not rewriting or correcting the available manual and parameter guide, but to add practical guides for many purposes, if as written text or video. Qui's videos are good examples for what they cover. Or Sharps introduction how to resample with Extreme Sample Converter. Or Kid Nepros elementary guide for sampling into the Kronos, etc.

[Sharp]

I think the KORG manuals are some of the best written manuals I've seen. As far as content and layout goes, they are top class all the way.

What I don't like is Adobe Reader. There are better programs for displaying PDF files that allow you to flip through the manual as if it was an typical eBook.

If you have a Tablet PC, it gets even way better. My trusty Acer W500 Windows 7 Tablet PC has been one of the best investments I've made in years.

Regards
Sharp.

[lotty1]

So what would help is not rewriting or correcting the available manual and parameter guide, but to add practical guides for many purposes, if as written text or video. Qui's videos are good examples for what they cover.

Yes I agree they are fantastic if it was not for him I would be still struggling not forgetting Sharp input as well and many more giving help on this forum.

[zzz]

I'm with Jim on this. As far as they go, the Korg manuals lay it all out in dry, but well written language. However, this is overkill if you want a quick and dirty explanation of how to play tricks with the , say, AL-1 engine. This is where we here, and youtube shines. The official Korg videos are brill, but as we all know, this is a complex beast, and we need about a thousand guides, how to's, etc.
The manuals are a lot easier if, by accident, one of your work printers, prints them out!

[lotty1]

The manuals are a lot easier if, by accident, one of your work printers, prints them out!

Yes I'm not in a position to print out 2000 pages. So I have to view them on a pc screen in two columns. Plus if you paid to have them printed by the time you did that the next version of software would come out

[bsbsantos]

I think the manuals are excelent. Very well written.
But you are right about the format. Columns are not the best format to read on a PC (I use acrobat btw, never tried another one). An ebook format would be nice.

[BasariStudios]

In the hundreds of manuals that i have its probably the BEST Manual.

[danatkorg]

I think the manuals are excelent. Very well written.
But you are right about the format. Columns are not the best format to read on a PC (I use acrobat btw, never tried another one). An ebook format would be nice.

I agree that it would be nice to have a single-column formatted version. I'm a little concerned that managing any resulting layout changes might be time-consuming, given that it's about 1,400 pages in its current form. At some point I may experiment and see how it goes.

[lotty1]

I think the manuals are excelent. Very well written.
But you are right about the format. Columns are not the best format to read on a PC (I use acrobat btw, never tried another one). An ebook format would be nice.

I agree that it would be nice to have a single-column formatted version. I'm a little concerned that managing any resulting layout changes might be time-consuming, given that it's about 1,400 pages in its current form. At some point I may experiment and see how it goes.

Dan
I have converted 70% of the Manual to Single column but Numbering and Indexing go out the window.

[michelkeijzers]

I also think the manuals are great. I have to admit it's long time ago I read an operation guide; mostly I go directly to the parameter guide.

Because the manuals are so big (especially the parameter guide), I can imagine people are a bit reluctant to read them, but they are not really for reading from page 1 to page 1400 or whatever. Just read the sections you are interested in. In PDF format it is very easy to read. Also I am used to read (complex) technical documentation so I am kind of used to it.

I have a big monitor and can turn it to show one page with big font or even two pages next to each other. If you read it on a small monitor or even a notebook or smaller screen than the two column layout can get in the way. Personally I don't mind.

[Stevesan]

The manual is great. Well written, and fairly well-organized. I have written a few manuals a few years back, using Adobe Framemaker, and although such a software helps organize cross-references etc. it's a lot of work producing something as good as this.

Still, what this and most other manuals lack is the tutorial information that not only explains HOW to do something, but also WHY it need be done, and in what ORDER you do things.

A beast like KRONOS can me intimidating without any knowledge of the workflow involved for getting the most out of the stuff that is in there.

[QuiRobinez]

I've read a lot of synth manuals over the last decades, but this is one of the best manuals that i've seen. It has a well thought out chapter setup and a lot of info is available in these manuals. What i really like is the 'real life' examples in the parameter guide. For instance the AMS mixer is a quite complex thing to understand, but the manual gives a very good and detailed description with picture examples of how to achieve things.

The only thing i'm missing in these guides is a detailed description of the KARMA 'template' parameters. For instance the cluster template parameter of KARMA can have a number of different values. Now this information can't be found in the current manuals. I had to use the old KARMA 1 manuals to dig this information up. The numbers weren't correct in these old manuals, but it was close enough to figure out what each number was doing in that parameter.

What would be nice is we could get a KARMA addon guide that displayes the template parameters, just the way i did in my KARMA 2 tutorial on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSXNL8-ZHFU (jump to 6.10 minutes to see the description of that parameter)

The 2 colomn layout if fine by me, once you know that it's a two colomn layout it's easy to adapt the reading style.

[michelkeijzers]

For PCG Tools I also written a manual which is quite comprehensive, but not 1400 pages like the parameter guide.

It is my first 'real' manual but it is quite difficult to write a good manual. Some problems (also described by others above):
- writing features is one thing, explaning work flow (if possible) is another.
- using cross references (or even links) is very time consuming to make.
- screen shots tend to change (at least in PCG Tools), I don't take the time to update all screenshots when something change (that would be another project, like an automatic screen grabber/controller).
- explaining enough for beginner users, having not much understanding of PCG files, and not duplicating too much to annoy advanced users.
- what to put in what document? I now put everything in one document, but some items should normally belong to another.
- describing features different for different versions/models. Repeat each time or make a general remark (and might be missed)?
- Keeping writing style consequent.