Flashes of Panic

Functional software is all alike, but every non-functional program is non-functional in its own way.

Understand that your email to support@company.com is probably going to be read by someone who deals with a range of issues over a number of products (and, probably, versions of products.) Chekhovian terseness is not rewarded.

They’re going to want to know exactly what you’re dealing with. That is, a product name (and/or website URL,) a version number (if it’s not a website,) and some basic information about your working environment (Mac or Windows? OS 9, OS X (10.2? 10.3?), XP, or Win2K? And, maybe, which browser? Which version, specifically, of that browser?)

They need this information because, even though you may think it’s the software that’s broken, 90% of the time there is something in your environment which is causing the problem, and they need to identify that something. Without knowing your environment, they’d be justified in just saying, “Hey, it works for me.” (This is assuming, of course, that you told them what’s not working, and didn’t use relative terms like “newer” or “older”, or imprecise terms like “your website” or “your CD.”)

If you’re writing about an error, they’ll want to know exactly what the error message says. If you’re able to identify what you were doing (or trying to do) when the error came up, that’s great, but for pity’s sake don’t just say, “It didn’t work,” or “I couldn’t sign on.”

Come to think of it, maybe you just want to read How To Ask Questions The Smart Way.

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