Re: manuals w/almost identical content

Subject: Re: manuals w/almost identical content
From: Bill Burns <BillDB -at- ILE -dot- COM>
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1998 08:40:02 -0600

Debbie,

> Well, there's another opinion in the company. This opinion says every
> user/customer should get a manual named for *his* card. In most cases, the
> "XX Family" name includes a part of every board's product name, but in at
> least one case it doesn't. This opinion also says that too many notes
> throughout a manual is confusing for the user ("This function is only for
> users of boards A, B and C. If you have boards D and E, ignore this
> function.")
>
I agree with this sentiment. I find it frustrating to have to sift through
mounds of information only to learn that the features every other card
supports are unsupported by mine. (The Slackware 3.0 Linux installation is
an excellent example of this.)

This sounds like the kind of design for which FrameMaker would be perfect.
I've done some extensive customizations using FrameMaker's conditional text
feature. I also know of at least one division at IBM where the documentation
for an entire product line is contained in a single volume of source files.
They use variables and conditional text to customize the content for
specific products. The files for a specific document never really exist
(which is why they call these "virtual" documents). When they want to
generate files for one product's documentation, they import the settings in
a control file over a book, the conditional settings and variables are set,
et voila! they've got their book.

One issue that may be relevant for you, though, is Frame's lack of support
for bidirectional text flows. If your language set includes Hebrew, you'll
have to use a different application.

HTH

Bill Burns
Senior Technical Writer/Technology Consultant
ILE Communications
billdb -at- ile -dot- com

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