Doc Review Process: What Works for You?

[Carole Pivarnik <carole -at- tuliphillstudio -dot- com>]

I'm curious about the tools and processes others use to get feedback from 
programmers and SMEs while developing technical documentation.

In my situation (working as part of a small...er, TINY...development team 
for a proprietary software product), both the programmer and I work from 
home (and live about two hours apart). When absolutely necessary, we'll 
meet at his house or mine to get collaborative work done. Usually, though, 
we are able to conduct productive reviews and feedback sessions by phone 
and email. For example, when there is a new software feature he wants to 
explain, he'll call me and describe it while I follow along in my copy (he 
sends software updates so I can install them prior to these discussions), 
asking questions as we go. Then I write the draft chapter or section, 
calling or emailing for clarification as needed. When the draft is ready 
for his review, I email or FTP it to him. When he has reviewed it, we 
arrange a phone conference at a mutually convenient time. As we talk, I 
have both the software and my document loaded. I can double-check behaviors 
in the software and make small doc edits as we speak. For more extensive 
changes, I insert notes from our discussion and do edits or rewrites later.

It's a very iterative process that has worked well for us during the 
initial drafting of a 300+ page user guide. The phone discussions can be 
intense but I like the immediacy and the ability to engage in an 
interactive dialog. It also completely avoids the problem I've experienced 
in larger teams, where multiple reviews submit feedback in writing and then 
I was tasked with interpreting that feedback, eliminating redundancies, and 
resolving conflicting requests.

I'd love to hear some discussion and opinions about what does and doesn't 
work when it comes to documentation review processes...

Carole Pivarnik
Staff Technical Writer
SDA, Inc.


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