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I'd like to thank everyone who replied to my question about portfolios. The
consensus was that one most definitely should be updating one's portfolio
while one is working. Also, surprisingly, everyone who wrote to me said
that "My boss wanted it that way" was an acceptable answer to an interview
question about any aspect of the writing.
Following these replies, I went over the manual I wrote for the vaporware
software, and I plan on having it printed and bound. I worked on it for
eight months, and I'm quite pleased with it. There's no reason why I can't
have it in my portfolio even if it never got professionally printed. I've
also started collecting samples of my work at my current job. No harm in
being prepared.
Thanks, everyone, for sharing your experience and thoughts on the subject.