Re[2]: Producing Books

[Virginia Day <Virginia_Day -at- DATACARD -dot- COM>]

     Gina,

     I've used Word almost exclusively for 6-8 years.  It has shortcomings,
     but you can produce attractive and usable documentation (any size, any
     number of pages) using it. (I secretly love Frame because I'm a techie
     at heart.)

     If I were making the decision, I'd consider:

     --whether I had a staff of tool-loving writers (to learn Frame and to
     set up and use document conventions in Frame)

     --how I wanted to re-use content (Frame and Word handle this
     differently, non-pubs re-users want Word)

     --how often I planned to update information and how I would handle
     updates (reprinting, rev packets, etc.  Frame tends to offer
     more/better tools in this area)

     --whether/how I planned to provide online information (Frame-to-PDF is
     a song, Frame to help is a groan, Word is sort of the opposite)

     --whether I would have the in-house staff (where I can control
     training) to write manuals or if I was planning to rely on contractors
     (I might loose access to good writers if I required Frame, Frame users
     can charge more, contractors would need to follow my in-house
     conventions)

     As you can tell, I don't consider PageMaker to be a useful tool for
     writing documents.  However, I do use it to lay out labels (how to
     replace the printer cartridge type labels), install charts, quick
     reference sheets, etc.

     HTH, Virginia


______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: Re: Producing Books
Author:  Gina Hertel <Ghertel -at- ALPHA88 -dot- COM> at Internet
Date:    2/11/98 3:25 PM


Stephen--
Thanks for getting things back on track and for your feedback in
response to my RFI.
Gina

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Stephen D. Martin [SMTP:smartin -at- STORM -dot- CA]
> Sent: Wednesday, February 11, 1998 1:50 PM
> To:   TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU
> Subject:      Re: Producing Books
>
> Walker, Arlen P wrote:
>
> >       > Remember: it is a poor worker who blames the tools.
> >       Even though (s)he may be entirely correct to do so?
>
> > It's not correct. It's true the choice of the tool can make the job
> > easier (or more difficult). But there always remain ways to do a
> > quality job with even the most mediocre (or worse) tools. The best
>
> Funnily enough I don't recall quality of the work ever having come
> into
> question.
>
> Gina asked whether PageMaker or FrameMaker might be a "must have".
> Christopher responded to the effect that Word was just spiffy keen,
> and
> all those people whining about it were just trying to blame Word for
> thier own shortcomings.
>
> Whether or not a quality job is possible with Word, or PageMaker, or
> FrameMaker is moot, we can take it for granted that with enough time
> and
> effort it is possible.  The more important question is: If you can do
> the job in five hours using FrameMaker, or in five - ten hours using
> Word, which would you choose?
>
>
> Given my experience on the last four jobs I did (two major manuals,
> one
> chapter updating that turned into a creatign a whole new manual, and a
> minor manual editing job), I could have gotten the same work done with
> a
> lot less headaches and in a lot less time by using something other
> than
> Word (or less buggy versions).
>
> Personally, if you want to use Microsloth products, I'd stick with
> Office95 for now, and possibly jump straight to Office 98.  There are
> a
> host of other packages out there and for anybody to reject perfectly
> valid complaints about any particular package is inexcusable.
>
> --
> Stephen D. Martin
> President, Stephen Martin Enterprises
> http://www.somemag.com
>
>
> ~~
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