Re: Documentation Deliverables for Complex Scenario?

[Deborah Hemstreet <dvora -at- tech-challenged -dot- com>]

Hi All,

I want to thank you all for taking the time to give me some good thought 
provoking answers. You've reminded me of some ideas I'd forgotten, and 
supported some of my original reactions to the issues at hand.

I especially appreciated Geoff reminding me to think about 
context/sensitive or embedded Help. The client has indeed begun to do 
this, but there is room for improvement. So I will encourage them to 
proceed, but make some suggestions.

Organization is indeed going to be the key here. As I learn about the 
business processes and how they are handled via the SW, I will be sure 
to pay attention to this.

My client believes strongly that their end-users need to have access to 
information about what the SW is doing in the background. From what they 
have said, I believe it's because of the sensitive nature of some of the 
tasks. Clients want to be reassured that a process is handled in a 
certain manner. Yes I agree with Geoff and others... I really don't 
think the client wants to know what the SW is doing in the background. 
What they really want to know is how to do something, and how they know 
it is accomplished. I think I can provide the information the client 
wants in a way that is more focussed on how the user's needs are met.

Finally, I believe that Doris's idea of a customizable Help landing page 
is brilliant. If anyone has some suggestions or tips for how that could 
be integrated with FlashHelp, please let me know.  Doris shared a few 
thoughts on this as well. I will see how the client reacts to this idea.

Of course, at the end of the day, it will all break down into funding, 
and what is feasible at this time or not. I do know that my client has 
already added some of my ideas to their list of future improvements. So 
I am optimistic in the long run.

Thanks again for your suggestions and input.

Deborah
http://www.tech-challenged.com
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2009 tips, tricks, and best practices.
http://www.doctohelp.com/SuperPages/Webcasts/

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