Re: suggestions for documenting unlabeled fields

["Jane Bergen" <jbergen1 -at- earthlink -dot- net>]

I just "finished" (loose term as I want no one to know it was ME....)
a project documenting an inhouse inventory tracking monstrosity. They
(developers) left field names, controls, etc. unnamed, or sometimes
named with duplicate names, and many were misspelled. So were the
windows and dialog titles. They had a couple of windows with NO names
(yikes! I just told the poor user how to open it and referred to it by
its function), or windows with different functions but the SAME name
(i.e., "Receiving" but different functions). I nearly tore my hair out
and wore my teeth down to nubs, but I was told to never mind the UI,
it was "set in stone" with misspellings and all.

It happens.

Jane Bergen

----- Original Message -----
From: Jan Stanley <janron -at- CONCENTRIC -dot- NET>
To: <TECHWR-L -at- LISTSERV -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU>
Sent: Thursday, August 26, 1999 6:32 PM
Subject: Re: suggestions for documenting unlabeled fields


>It's really tricky when you're up against the company president.
>Maybe you could appeal to his financial sense:
>
>If the fact that a control isn't labeled means that you have to
>write a couple of sentences or a paragraph where a single phrase
>or sentence would do, you're (1) using more of your time than
>necessary, which costs the company money, and (2) increasing the
>size of the documentation (if it's paper), which means printing
>is more expensive, which...costs the company money.
>
>Good luck!
>
>Jan
>janron -at- concentric -dot- net