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Subject:RE: Why I need an Index From:"Brierley, Sean" <Sean -dot- Brierley -at- ipc -dot- com> To:<techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com> Date:Mon, 14 May 2007 13:16:28 -0400
An index is an intelligent and helpful way to find information.
Word search finds every instance of a word in a document. Perhaps in a
long document, a particular word is included 100 times, but only 10 of
those times are useful to performing some task. An index lists those 10
instances and without the index, the reader has to filter the 100 hits
they get on the subject.
Additionally, an index can list alternative ways of referring to
something. You can index synonyms and use see and see also references to
help teach your reader how to use the document. Perhaps there are
several industry terms for one item, and your book only uses one of
those. You could index all three and use see also to show how to look
something up.
You could show examples of how a search is not optimal. For example,
Microsoft Word can be used to flag two spaces after a period. Try
searching for that. Also, you can use sequence fields to set up lists in
Microsoft Word, try searching for that. Etc.
A good index will help the reader more efficiently find the content they
need.
Cheers,
Sean
-----Original Message-----
From: techwr-l-bounces+sean -dot- brierley=ipc -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
[mailto:techwr-l-bounces+sean -dot- brierley=ipc -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On
Behalf Of Kevin McGowan
Sent: Monday, May 14, 2007 1:04 PM
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Subject: Why I need an Index
Just thought I'd share this one with the group.
On Friday, I was meeting with my bosses and we were discussing the doc
projects and how I'm progressing. I pointed out that one extra project I
wanted to do was to add Indexes to the current documentation. We have
word files...and none of them have ever been Indexed. i've only been at
this job a month, but I figured this would be well worth the time
investment.
The question asked of me was: "Well, what's the point of an Index
anyway?
Can't the reader just use Ctrl-F?"
I'm not sure what anyone else would have said...but I just came back
with "I'm going to make some indexes."
Kevin
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