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Subject:What do people work from? From:"Partridge, Robert" <Robert -dot- Partridge -at- au -dot- unisys -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com> Date:Fri, 29 Jul 2005 09:11:53 +1000
Hi,
A bit of background first. The writers here used to get fairly complete
functional specifications and detailed design specifications from which
to work. These by no means provided all the information required to
write about the product, but at least described all the functions of the
product, what it did, how and why it did it. Nowadays these
specifications are either non-existent or so lacking in information as
to be nearly useless.
What do software (in particular, but I'd be interested in responses from
anyone) writers work from? Nothing but the product? Interviews with
SMEs? Basic specifications? Detailed specifications? A full set of
design documents?
If you work from specifications, how complete would you say they are? Do
they cover all the areas of the product leaving you to dig down for
details? Or do they just provide a bare sketch of the product causing
you to have many SME interviews to ascertain the scope of the product?
I know this issue has cropped up before and I've got some information
from the archives about it. But I don't think it's been asked recently
(apologies if it has) so I'm asking again to see if the situation has
changed.
I must admit that when I started here I was surprised by the expectation
of fairly complete specifications. I've been a tech writer for some 15
years now and only once before have I had that privilege - at a
financial institution where for obvious reasons all software had to be
very carefully designed and vetted before it was built.
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