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I normally write up a new concept or procedure according to
how it was intended to be used by whatever lead customer or
industry was the driving force behind getting a feature
included.
But, our products being the sorts of things they are, when
they're out in the world for a while, they start getting
picked up by new customers who have different reasons for
buying, whose industry uses a different terminology, or
who otherwise come from a different milieu or mindset.
Once I grasp the difference, if it's not practical to
simply tweak the current pages that deal with that aspect
of the product, it's easy to just create another help
topic or two. As other people have observed, help is normally
not accessed in any pre-determined order. You can give it
a bit of structure with ToC, but most people resort to
the Search box first and look at the ToC only as an aid
to orientation or a memory prompt... a source of possible
keywords to plug into the Search field.
-----Original Message-----
From: Dan Goldstein
Sent: Wednesday, April 20, 2011 12:26 PM
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Subject: RE: Repetition is the mother of...
I have no preference. This is a classic document requirement question
that tech writers pose to the customer/client/boss/collaborator. If we
don't know and can't ascertain what the reader(s) would prefer, we make
an educated guess.
A disadvantage of repetition is that some readers dislike the increased
document size. A disadvantage of linking is that some readers dislike
following links.
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