How often do you find yourself searching the Internet for “how to” instructions on various procedures, only to find yourself presented with a list of blogs to investigate, rather than a direct answer to satisfy your query?
Additionally, when you click over to read up on the subject, the author has written a long-winding post, with the “meat” of the matter hidden between screenshots, somewhere in the article. All this means that you need to waste valuable time, & read the entire article, & since the author may not even be an authority, you may still come away empty-handed. In fact, you might need to read 10 different posts, & try out the instructions offered by each before you hit on the correct procedure.
Obviously, there was a need for a system that offered clear, easy to follow, correct instructions on a variety of procedures, & that’s exactly the gap this startup Minervaknows has stepped into. The team here has developed an extension for Google’s Chrome browser, which gives clear, clickable instructions on various “how tos”, which they call “recipes”.
This system allows users to, for instance, follow a step-by-step guide to enabling Gmail 2-factor authentication, while browsing Gmail. Users are guided through a series of clicks, which solve the problem at hand, on the spot.
While this system is fabulous for the general public, Minerva also solves another problem, & that’s the difficulty many businesses or service providers find when they need to set up documentation to guide users who want to use their products, Websites or services.
Providers no longer need to go through a long & evolved process of creating a distributed PDF with screenshots & arrows to point out their procedure. All they need to do is alert Minervaknows to set up a “how to” & then go through the physical process of their “how to”. Minerva will then automatically create a “recipe” for the procedure & through a series of clickable links make it accessible to any user.
Currently, Minervaknows offers a few general “recipes” on their extension, but it plans to grow its guide list exponentially. Also, they have an extension in the works for Firefox. So, it looks as if finding out “how to” do almost anything might just become a whole lot easier in the near future.
Image credit: Minervaknows
