Open Source Support/Training Tools

Software training/support can be an expensive game. For third parties, it usually involves an initial outlay for the software, and regular software and hardware upgrades to keep current. Even for software vendors, the cost of support software can be prohibitive, and represents money that could be better spent on development.

Open source programs offer a way to supplement your toolkit for no cost, whilst tapping into the enthusiasm and support that this community offers. Freeware is a bit more of a crapshoot, but there are several quality programs out there.

In this blog I will be looking at a number of free and open source applications that I utilise regularly in a support/training environment. This is by no means the end of the options available – if there is a particular function you are looking for, it is well worth a quick look in Sourceforge.

Wink
Functionality: Screenshot capture/presentation software
Pros:
Easy to capture, annotate and publish a series of screen captures
Capture by time-period, keyboard shortcut or on any key/mouse action
Quick and polished presentations in flash or html
Cons:
Limited output formats
No HTML5
Limited annotation themes

Wink is a great program, and one I use very regular. Start a new project, set the program to record a screenshot every time you type or click the mouse, perform an action to demonstrate and voila! You have an easy to follow set of screenshots. The flash export is very solid and supports navigation buttons (useful for web demos, rapid navigation of steps). Getting the images out of the project generally requires saving to HTML and accessing the resulting images folder – not an elegant solution but hardly a time-waster.

The uses for this program are extensive, and the presentation streamlined and stable.

Camstudio

Functionality: Screen video capture tool
Pros: Stable
Configure screen capture area
Lightweight background capture
Cons:
Unable to configure screen capture area on the fly
Large video output

Camstudio is a great tool to use when you want a precise record of onscreen actions. It can be configured to capture a specified area of the screen, which I've used when working on web-page support to cut out the menu bars and Start bar. The inability to redefine the capture area on the fly or have it follow the mouse is a downside however.

A useful tool to have in your kit.

CDBurnerXP

Function: CD/DVD burning application
Pros: Simple interface
ISO burning and creation
Cons: None to speak of, but I have sometimes encountered a bug where an ISO file is deleted upon creation – couldn't find any reports of this from other users so could just be me.

This program is what it is – a lightweight program for creating CDs and CD images. Everyone has to create CD/DVD resources at some point and CDBurnerXP makes it a breeze.

qvPDF
Function: Print any document to PDF
There are a lot of programs out there for printing PDFs, but this app is a good choice. A new printer appears in your list, and sending to it gives the option to save to desktop, to file, email etc. Options for contrast, page size etc are easily configured. It does require ghostscript, so hop onto Sourceforge and install this first.

GIMP

Function: A graphics manipulation program with similar functionality to Photoshop.
Pros: Powerful image options
Cons: Extended options can be complicated to the novice

GIMP is a powerful tool for many reasons, but in the support environment it is useful for creating graphics, disk-covers, performing image conversions and adding text boxes. Yes, you could do most of this in mspaint or Paint .Net, but the results will be far more polished with the GIMP.

Vmware/Virtual Box

Function: Virtual desktop software
These programs allow you to create a self-contained complete operating system within a window on your desktop. Why is this useful? Because you can create a training environment completely tailored around a single program. You can test compatibility with all installed applications and not worry about breaking this with your day-to day activities. It breaks? Just reload from a backup in two seconds.

If you've seen someone performing support on their normal desktop, where things go wrong, emails and IM windows pop up unbidden and you can see their messy desktop with a picture of their kids in the background, you can see the logic of this kind of environment.

Creating virtual desktops isn't cheap, however. You still need a licence for Windows for each environment, as well as any software you may need. But the presentation and time-saving factor could be worth it.

Support Details

http://supportdetails.com/

Need to grab the basic specs from a user to support their OS and web browser? This site doesn't have everything, but is a quick way to get basic information from a novice.

Cacoo

http://cacoo.com/

This web program is in beta and I've only just started using it, but it is a very solid idea-mapping program with a wide range of sensible stock images. Worth checking out for flow charts, area maps, graphs and more.


In summary, the only thing you stand to lose with the above programs is time, and they are well worth the investment. Don't wait until you can afford the latest commercial support software - start achieving with what you want with your support/training environment today!