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Subject:Documenting installers? From:Jay -dot- Malone -at- ser -dot- com To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Tue, 25 May 2004 10:42:46 -0400
Before my previous gig, I balked at the idea of documenting installers. My
previous client decreed it, however, and the first few times out we did the
bare minimum and the focus was on the technical requirements. Help Desk
calls soared. By the time I left that job, the install manual was so
detailed that it included a screenshot of every single step, with a circle
around the button to click. The audience was civilian employees of a US
gov't department. Many of them had scant computer experience, and even so
were the most knowledgeable people at their site. They needed what I
considered an absurd amount of hand-holding, but in reality it was
absolutely necessary. Once we babied them through the process, trouble
tickets for the installers all but stopped.
The end users for my current project are orders of magnitude more technical,
and the approach is entirely different. The actual install is only one
chapter. The other chapters talk about the purpose of the applications,
hardware/SW/network requirements, configuration requirements, licensing
issues, security issues, and some stuff related to the particular
environment.
Jay
Jay Malone
independent technical writer and editor,
on-site at SER Solutions, Dulles, VA
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