Comparative access rates for online documentation and human consulting
The National Magnetic Fusion Energy Computer Center has taken a strongly collaborative approach to user services, developing its consulting staff and its online documentation software as joint aspects of a unified effort to answer user questions. A fairly strong positive correlation between consulting-query rates and online-reading rates across many subject categories suggests that computerized passage delivery can successfully complement human contact as a way to provide information to users. We also found sharp discrepancies in rates for some topics. A few were artifacts of our system; others suggest an agenda for online documentation improvements as well as an enduring need for diverse responses to user inquiries. 10 refs., 2 figs.
- Research Organization:
- Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (USA)
- DOE Contract Number:
- W-7405-ENG-48
- OSTI ID:
- 6788742
- Report Number(s):
- UCRL-99007; CONF-8810122-1; ON: DE88014143
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 51. annual meeting of the American Society for Information Science, Atlanta, GA, USA, 23 Oct 1988; Other Information: Portions of this document are illegible in microfiche products
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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