New opportunities for software developers and technical authors: Thanks to social network buttons and widgets for commenting on Facebook and Disqus, online user manuals created with Dr.Explain can be used for promoting software products through social networks.
Summer, 2013—Indigo Byte Systems, LLC announces the release of Dr.Explain 4.9 ( http://www.drexplain.com/ ), an application used by software developers and technical authors to automate the creation of software help systems and user manuals.
Dr.Explain is based on a unique interface analysis and screen capture system. Thanks to this system, Dr.Explain can automatically analyze an application’s user interface, take screenshots of all controls (including buttons, menus, lists, and editable areas), and then add explanatory callouts to all images in the draft help system. After that, all one needs to do is add descriptions to the callouts, and save the result in the HTML, CHM, RTF, or PDF format.
Dr.Explain is successfully used for creating user manuals by tens of thousands of software developers all over the world, including startups and major firms like Hewlett-Packard, Lockheed Martin, NEC, Fujitsu, Bosch, HSBC, and Michelin.
What’s new in Dr.Explain 4.9
In addition to the features available in the previous version (see the change list on the application’s website), version 4.9 offers some new ones:
- New interactive design of online user manuals. The modern style, a number of ready-made color schemes, and flexible settings for creating a unique design let one easily make the online user manual an integral part of the corporate or product website.
- Social media optimization (SMO) of user manuals. In the new version of Dr.Explain, some tools have been added for promoting software products through social networks. A software developer can add the “Like” (Facebook), “Google +1”, “Tweet”, or other buttons to the pages of the online user manual. Users that like some feature of the software product can easily create posts about it in their social networks, so that their friends will quickly learn about the application via a news feed.
- User generated content. Now Dr.Explain can add widgets for commenting on Facebook or Disqus (the most popular content commenting platform) to a help system in order to provide instant feedback from software product users and create a strong “viral” effect. This way, information about the product can easily spread over social networks even without any efforts on the software developer’s part, creating a brand recognition effect.
- Adding videos to user manuals. Dr.Explain provides a handy tool for adding videos from YouTube and other popular video hosting services to user manuals, which will make the help system even more vivid, informative, and illustrative.
- Instant PDF preview. The quick PDF preview feature lets one easily preview pages without fully exporting the help project to the PDF format.
Availability and compatible devices
Dr.Explain 4.9 can be used on a PC with Microsoft Windows XP, 2003, Vista, 7, or 8. For more details, explanatory videos, and the trial version of the product, please visit the developer’s website: http://www.drexplain.com/
Watch a live video demo: http://www.drexplain.com/live_demo/
Download a free trial: http://www.drexplain.com/download/ (40 Mb)
Facebook group: http://www.facebook.com/Dr.Explain
About the company
Indigo Byte Systems, LLC is a developer of software tools for creating help systems and user manuals. The company’s flagship product is Dr.Explain, a software application that helps tens of thousands of software developers to automate the labor-intensive process of creating user manuals. The developers team is led by Dr. Dennis Crane. He has a Ph.D. in Technical Sciences and is an expert on CAD/CAM systems. The company is a Microsoft Certified Partner, and also a Microsoft Silver Certified Partner for the ISV/Software Solutions Competency. For more information, please visit the project’s website: http://www.drexplain.com/
# # #
NOTE FOR THE EDITOR: Indigo Byte Systems, LLC will happily provide any information and the full version of Dr.Explain to help you prepare a review. Moreover, the company is offering the latest version of the product for your magazine’s CD issue.
Contacts for the press:
Dennis Crane
Indigo Byte Systems, LLC
CEO, lead developer
E-mail: info@drexplain.com