I sometimes get help requests from complete noobs, who don't really know what I mean by the XMB and stuff like that. What I'd do, if, for example, someone asked me how to downgrade 2.71 to 1.5 is assume they know nothing (or almost nothing) about running programs on a PSP, but assume they have sufficient PC knowledge to rename, move and copy files, and look into RAR and ZIP archives. What I mean by that is...

That sort of balance is OK for most people, and if they have no idea what I'm on about, they can always ask.

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Include EVERYTHING you possibly can. No tutorial is 100% idiot proof... If it's clear to one person, Someone else will come along that won't understand it.

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That is impractical.

If you look at my tutorials, you notice that I *try* to include everything...

>.< only to have people ask how to right click.

Honestly, if you try to include everything, the tutorial would be thousands of pages long and only say four paragraphs....

List of things when Asking for help:
I hope someone reads this. I might just put this as a separate post, with a few other guidelines.

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if you mkae text tutorials, you can just say for example "copy the files to...)

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Well first of all, I'd put those rules, in bold and/or italics, at the top of every tut. Second, you could create (or find) a set of tuts for the basic stuff and just link to them from the more advanced ones.

i would say include screenshots to make it easier for people like me

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I guess it depends on WHAT the tutorial IS. For instance, currently i'm writting a guide/tutorial on manually hacking and modding th PSP. I assume that the user has a decent knowledge and understanding of both PSP and PC stuff, as mentioned before (running homebrew, flashing, using archives, dummy-ing files, etc). But what i do is have an appendix section at the end where all tasks that are non-specific to the guide are detailed and tutored.

Eg, this main guide will explain where and how to replace the little loading bubble/wavy thing on the XMB bottom right hand corner with your own animation, such as the hex addresses and/or name of the graphic to replace in RCOEdit, etc. But things that are NOT SPECIFIC to THAT part of the guide, such as "How to edit 32-bit Bitmap files in PaintShop Pro 9", "Best flashing practice" and "Using the XVI32 Hex Editor" will all go in the appendix.

Now i use Word 2003, and usually convert my guides to a PDF when its ready 4 uploading. So i hav a table of contents, and links in the guide that'll link to other sections / chapters / headings.

So i do this because i prefer a structured approach to guide writing. It is primarily for the experienced, but all the prerequisites/dilly-dally's/tasks that are commonly performed with most parts of the guide will be in the appendix.

Here's an example. All words in BOLD would link the user to a section in the appendix, at the end of the guide, detailing a common task that is regularly performed throughout the guide. The appendix would also contain a list of terms and definitions - the things that link to its definition are in ITALIC.

1. Backup the vshmain.prx from the 3.03 section of the firmware (nodule folder), you will notice that the 1.50 bootstrap section (module folder) obviously doesn't have one.
2. Hex edit the vshmain.prx file and do an ASCII Search for update_plugin.prx (it should be located at $ADDRESS BLAh bLAh BLAH).
3. ASCII Edit the path, changing it from "flash0:/vsh/nodule/update_plugin.prx" to "flash1:/ftp/ftp.prx". Zero out the remaining bytes, as always.
4. Flash the new file, and test the XMB Network Update to see if the FTP server starts.

So yeah. That provides a straightforward task for reference, but also the newbies won't be lost. I know it's a bit of a pain having to go back and forth from the task-at-hand to the appendix, but the target audience of the guide is fairly-competent users of PC's and PSP modding and such. Besides, i recommend at the beginning of the guide that they should check out the appendix if they e.g., dont know much about hex editing.

Sorry for the very long post lol, but that's what i find is the most practical structure for a guide (especially long ones). Peace.

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agreewith shez!!! screenshots says more than 40-200 words

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Oh yeah screenshots 4 sure. They are fun.

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