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Subject:Document editing PDF vs. Word From:M -dot- Vina-Baltsas -at- mindray -dot- com To:techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com Date:Mon, 18 Aug 2014 09:58:46 -0400
Ugh, I think I've gotten myself into a pickle here and may need some help.
I work for a Chinese company. For about two years, they have been
writing/editing our US manuals. Our role in the states is edit their
manuals. Currently, they were sending the files in a .pdf format. While it
was sometimes cumbersome to edit these files, and there are a lot of
edits, I like that it's reliable and also like how it presents the
information for the reviewer. Once they returned the edited document with
our comments, we would all review our individual comments to ensure that
they were made correctly.
We had a meeting last week with our Chinese counterparts and the US
project manager is suggesting that we edit the MS Word source files
instead of the .pdf because it is easier. It's not easier for those
managing the edits, but it's easier for those editing.
While myself and the other Chinese tech writer were skeptical about using
the merge feature in MS Word (as we both feel it's an unstable product), I
said I would do some testing to verify whether it's reliable or not. I've
never used the MS Word "merge" feature, but I don't have much confidence
in its reliability as my experience with more advanced Word features is
that they don't work well.
Pros to editing in Bluebeam
1) Each comment is labeled so you know who authored it. Comments can
easily be sorted.
2) You can easily merge comments from different reviewers which makes
sense when working in an environment that demands we work serially.
3) Easier for those managing the edits.
Cons to using Bluebeam
1) Project manager prefers editing source files.
Pros to editing in MS Word
1) Easier for reviewers to make their comments
2) Project manager prefers it.
Cons to editing in MS Word
1) Difficult for US tech writer to manage edits.
2) MS Word is not a stable product.
Has anyone had success using the MS Word merge feature?
Is there anyone out there that has a similar work model and could tell me
how they manage their edits?
Tel: 201.995.8350
m -dot- vina-baltsas -at- mindray -dot- com
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