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"mark _____" wrote:
Now this guy ... says that cross references should be hyperlinked and they need not have page numbers as hyperlinks serve the purpose. (we give out the user manuals to the customers in PDF format)
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The use of "should" implies a right or wrong answer, when it really just depends on personal flavor (no matter how you want to justify it). I'm wondering where he gets this opinion. Have you talked about his experiences on this matter and why he holds the opinions about the docs that he does? Some people adhere mercilessly to some dogma they heard one time without really examining that dogma any further. This could be an instance where he thinks the hyperlinks should not have numbers because he read it on the Internet, or heard someone mention it in the hall.
My personal flavor is that if you're going through the trouble of making it look like a print manual, people will probably want to print it, in which case they will need the page numbers because hyperlinks become useless. And I'm willing to bet that people will print out the manaul, or important pieces of it. I just got done doing a set of pdfs in which I included page numbers with the hyperlinks. But then again, those were install instructions that people would probably want a hardcopy of. You need to conduct some user research and figure out how your users will use the manual, and to get a better idea of what their expectations are. What you "should" do depends on their needs.
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Another bone of contention is that he wants the page layout should be
landscape. Does it not affect the screen shots layout in manuals? Also has anybody seen a user manual with a landscape layout?
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Why "should" it be landscape? Yes, changing between Portrait and Landscape affects _every_ aspect of page layout, obviously. The benefits someone already pointed out are good ones, but how often does thaose sorts of thing come into play for your product? I mean, will the user need to have the pages sitting on their keyboard? How will the user be using the manual? What sort of program are you writing for? Will the change in expected dimentions throw off the user (ie, expecting it in portrait and getting it in landscape). Personally, if I got a manual in landscape format, I'd think the writers did it as a cop-out attempt to make their product stand out, sort of like submitting a manuscript on colored paper to a magazine.
Just an aside, I'm sensing a certain amount of tension in what you've written. I don't know what the situation is, but you seem to be on the verge of dismissing everything "this guy" suggests simply to dismiss him. I don't know what sort of person you're dealing with (though my own notions of marketers in general gives me a fairly biased vision), but since you have to collaborate with him, take a couple of seconds to collect your cool. It's easier to negotiate, and get what you want, when you're not approaching things with tension. Just a thought. If this is off base, I apologize. Everyone needs a reality check once in while, even me!!! :-) Quick question, have both of you discussed the exact purpose of the style guide, and the exact purpose of the documentation? A misunderstanding at such a basic level could be creating tension and will make your job harder.
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