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Subject:This is what happens when... From:"Parks, Beverly" <ParksB -at- EMH1 -dot- HQISEC -dot- ARMY -dot- MIL> Date:Tue, 1 Dec 1998 08:46:49 -0700
... a non-technical tech editor reviews a technical document.
The document is a security requirement spec for a LAN. There is a section on
auditing. One of the generic audit requirements is titled, "Read Access Only
to Audit Trails".
I would bet money that when this tech editor got this document to edit, that
title was written correctly as "Read Only Access to Audit Trails". However,
she corrected what she perceived as a misplaced "only". Her revised title
doesn't really make sense, so should have prompted a question to the author
(IMO).
It may have been less confusing to her had the author used a hyphen:
"Read-Only Access to Audit Trails", but I bet he didn't. But even that could
be confused as some sort of command: [You should] Read - Only [the section
on] Access to Audit Trails.
Just thought I'd share... :)
Bev Parks
parksb -at- emh1 -dot- hqisec -dot- army -dot- mil
