Re: Baiting for the single source rant

[TDean -at- envirosys -dot- com]

Hello all!


I had not realized that so many technical writers were against single
sourcing.  When I attended the STC National Conference recently, single
sourcing WAS a hot concept.

If I had an ideal technical communication setting (welcome to Tina's
Fantasy Land), I prefer to separate media outputs such as online help and
printed documentation because the end product is going to have much better
quality. Single sourcing minimizes my control of how I want the online help
to appear.   (I always seem to come back to my classroom and theory vs.
real world dilemma). However, companies are romanced by single sourcing -
especially smaller software companies because they can have online help in
half the time and money.  I think single sourcing has its advantages and
disadvantages, but my perspective is that it will become more and more
popular for companies that do not want to or do not have the money to
invest in improving technical communication.

Anyway, I could not help but comment on this even though this was directed
towards Andrew.  Currently, my company is using Doc-to-Help, and we are
thinking of buying Author It.

:)
Tina Dean

=^.^=
    *


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