Re: Terms for Software Configuration?

[Jane Bergen <janeb -at- ANSWERSOFT -dot- COM>]

Stuart Burnfield writes:

> This is a question for people who write about system admin software.
> I need to know whether there are industry accepted terms for
> installing, configuring and messing with software. If not I'll have
> to make some up. The stages and terms we use currently are:

(stuff snipped)

I'm not sure if this answer is actually what you are looking for,
Stuart, but I've recently started using the terms like this:

Install - what the user does
Configure - what the user does
Setup - the "agent" who magically does things behind the scenes

For example,

When you install the xyz module, Setup writes to the ......
directory. You can configure this file to ....... .

That sentence is just off the top of my head. It really does make
sense when I use it in a real sense.

It seems that most users, expecially experienced users as we would
hope the System Administrators would be, can deal with "Setup" as an
entity. And it helps to use an agent instead of passive voice (no,
this is not a passive-voice discussion), because it clarifies to the
user whether he or she is supposed to do something, or whether that
something just gets magically done as a result of something the user
does.

Jane
...............................................................
 Jane Bergen, Technical Writer
 janeb -at- answersoft -dot- com   or   janeb -at- airmail -dot- net
    "The difference between the right word and the
     almost right word is the difference between lightning
     and the lightning bug" (Mark Twain)
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