RE: Gnaargh! Or, I Am Not Psychic

Subject: RE: Gnaargh! Or, I Am Not Psychic
From: "Stephanie Erickson" <serickson -at- infinitecampus -dot- com>
To: <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>
Date: Wed, 13 Sep 2006 09:23:25 -0500

We also use the AGILE method here, at least in development. I'm not
involved in the daily dev meetings, but there is a "functional doc"
setting built into our case workflow. Most developers are excellent at
assigning their cases to me after they've coded it, even if it doesn't
really need anything. There are sometimes when I have to bring down the
axe on a few. I think they find it humorous to see me angry.

The problem with AGILE is that it only accounts for functional
documentation, in my opinion. There are still use cases and best
practices and training materials that need to be revisited so I'm
battling that right now.

The system we use for development cases is FogBugz, it has a release
notes field on all the cases. Again, it's a challenge to get the
developers to enter anything but it makes the writing of release notes
so much easier.

Stephanie Erickson
Documentation Specialist/Product Management
Infinite Campus, Inc.

-----Original Message-----
From: techwr-l-bounces+serickson=infinitecampus -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
[mailto:techwr-l-bounces+serickson=infinitecampus -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
] On Behalf Of Rainey, Ted
Sent: Wednesday, September 13, 2006 8:25 AM
To: Sarah Bouchier; techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Subject: RE: Gnaargh! Or, I Am Not Psychic

>What is the best process you've ever worked with (or dreamed of) that
>enables technical authors to find out about changes/new projects etc
>before the very last minute is past?

SCRUM methodology with daily stand up meetings have eliminated any of
the mysterious changes that used to show up or get dumped on the doc
team at the last minute. The AGILE process has to first be adopted then
accepted by all members of the team, though, and practiced, or it's back
to that wonderful world of waterfall method with writer-as-sleuth.

It can be a big change for an org or team, though, but if done right, is
a worthy time investment. A lot has been said about agile on the boards
- good and bad experiences alike - and there's a lot of info on the web
as well. Could be worth looking at.

-TR

-----Original Message-----
From: techwr-l-bounces+ted -dot- rainey=hp -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
[mailto:techwr-l-bounces+ted -dot- rainey=hp -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On Behalf
Of Sarah Bouchier
Sent: Tuesday, September 12, 2006 11:13 AM
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Subject: Gnaargh! Or, I Am Not Psychic

This will, I suspect, be a familiar rant to most of you.

I've just discovered that, shortly after both I and the client went
through and checked my company's user manual and online help against the
product, the development team made some major changes to the UI without
telling the doc team.

Normally I'd have picked this up through the paranoiac (though
justified, I feel!) checking I do anytime I have a few minutes spare,
but what with it being the last few days before the release deadline I
was working ten hour lunchless days as it was, and I +really+ didn't
have the spare time to go through the entire product to see if anything
had changed.

Unfortunately, there's scarcely a process here, never mind one that
includes the technical authors. The closest thing is the bug tracking
system, but apparently most of those changes didn't go through it (and
even if they had, I've yet to train the developers to assign bugs to
documentation after fixing).

What is the best process you've ever worked with (or dreamed of) that
enables technical authors to find out about changes/new projects etc
before the very last minute is past?

The prize for the best answer is me doing my damnedest to implement it
here :)

S.

-----------------------------------------
Sarah Bouchier
Technical Author

exony
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References:
RE: Gnaargh! Or, I Am Not Psychic: From: Rainey, Ted

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