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Re: Managing documentation in a rapid/agile/extreme programming environment
Subject:Re: Managing documentation in a rapid/agile/extreme programming environment From:"Richard G. Combs" <richard -dot- combs -at- voyanttech -dot- com> To:techwr-l Date:Wed, 10 Sep 2003 09:52:35 -0600
Bob Johnson wrote:
> Reviewing the archives, I've found some discussion of creating
> documentation in a rapid or agile environment, but nothing about managing
> user documentation in such an environment. Our development team is
> adopting agile development methods, and I've been asked to explain how we
> are going to fit documentation into this process. JoAnn Hackos's book was
> great when I needed to develop a documentation model that matched the
> waterfall model we used previously, since the Hackos model is itself
> essentially a waterfall model. But her concepts don't adapt well to an
> agile environment.
There's a short, breezy article at XProgramming.com that I've had on my cube
wall for some time now, with lots of yellow highlighting:
"Write an easy to use product that doesn't require a big manual. Then -
duh - don't write a big manual."
"Document as you go... Documenting a feature shouldn't be any more difficult
than implementing it. If your programmers can invent the bloody thing from
scratch in one iteration, your writers ought to be able to write it up in
the same time and stay only one iteration behind."
It's not a multi-hundred page model, but it (and perhaps other resources at
XProgramming.com) will give you some ideas. There probably isn't -- and
shouldn't be -- a multi-hundred page, Hackos-like model. If there were, it
wouldn't be very agile, would it? :-)
Richard
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Richard G. Combs
Senior Technical Writer
Voyant Technologies, Inc.
richardDOTcombs AT voyanttechDOTcom
303-223-5111
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rgcombs AT freeDASHmarketDOTnet
303-777-0436
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