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Subject:Re: Download manual from site From:Jay Maechtlen <techwriter -at- covad -dot- net> To:Erika Yanovich <ERIKA_y -at- rad -dot- com> Date:Wed, 08 Oct 2008 23:02:20 -0700
Erika Yanovich wrote:
> Kevin and all,
>
> We faced a very similar situation and at the end we dropped the entire idea of printing QSGs by packers, not because it is difficult but because of the sheer amount of administration of a few hundred QSGs on our side. We can get away with this as usually there is a business partner between us (the vendor) and the end user, who installs the equipment.
>
> Now we want to eliminate the CDs (that eliminated the printed manuals a few years ago), by download from our site. And here the 'situation' is back again because you can't ship a product without absolutely no instructions in the box, right? We feel that printing QSGs will defeat the purpose of the saving, so we are considering a 'universal' sheet that just points the user to our site for downloading the manual (perhaps together with product registration for activating the warranty).
>
> This download approach is probably not acceptable for products you buy privately for home usage, but our customers are large corporations, such as mobile operators or utilities.
>
> Your thoughts are appreciated.
>
> Erika
Being a large corp or utility certainly doesn't guarantee that Internet
access will be available when the device is being installed or configured.
Certainly, there are many environments that should be kept well away
from the Web.
(there's this thing called 'security')
Personally, I'd be damned annoyed if anything of value expected me to
download _ANYTHING_ to be able to configure and use it.
- unless I buy it used at the swap meet.
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