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Dave said:
>> ... Unfortunately, they can't tell me exactly WHY the documentation is so
good.
I'm wondering if anyone on the list has used benchmarking to compare your
documentation to that of other companies (or, for that matter, to other pubs
groups within your own organization).<<
A user of some internal documentation once told me he liked my document
because it gave him exactly the information he needed. By following the
instructions as they were written, he completed his task without running
into problems. It sounds simplistic, but I think that's a measure of good
documentation.
A good document:
- Delivers the information that is relevant to the task
- Is comprehensible to the user
- Is presented clearly
I suppose you could "benchmark" documentation semi-quantitatively by
measuring the time it takes users to find a piece of information, and/or the
time it takes to complete a given documented task.
You could also learn alot from bad documentation. Ask your fellow writers
what they *don't* like about certain documents. That way you can learn what
*not* to do :).
My documentation pet peeves:
- Information that is convoluted, or hard to find
- Irrelevant information
- Too much information
- Too many screen captures that contribute nothing to the document.
- Documentation that reads like the author didn't *really* know what he/she
was talking about.
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