Access to software versions: a rant

[Carrie Baker]

I am documenting software, a new version is compiled about every week
and goes into QA.
After lots of battles, I got authorization to access the drive the
software version is on so I can run the applications and document
them!
A few years ago, my authorization disappeared and I got it back again,
once I talked to the head of R&D etc.
This week, I couldn't see that drive again.
It turned out that the relatively new head of QA had done some tidying
up and taken the Technical Writer's authorization for accessing new
versions of the application away.

I sent an email cc'ed to all the world about this, then went to talk
to the QA manager.

So she asked me: "But why do you need access to the software??????"

Well.....I need to document it, for example, once they forgot to tell
me that all the menus were changed, and I only knew by looking at the
software that the menus had been changed.

I hate working with screen captures, I like to run the applications
(whenever possible) and see what happens when I click the buttons, as
well as making my own captures.

What other impressive reasons do you think a TW can have for wanting
to "run the application"?

Do other writers documenting software generally have access to the applications?

-- 
Carrie Baker
carriebak at gmail.com