RE: Should vs. Will, Must and Can

["Steve Hudson" <steve -at- wright -dot- com -dot- au>]

Avoid using should, could, may, possibly etc as they indicate indecision.
"Will" moves the sentence into the future and should be avoided as well,
unless writing ISO9001 compliant P&P where the future tense is more strictly
correct and CYA at the corp level.

Additionally, if the users dont have the confidence that the product WILL do
something, it only MAY do something, you have reduced your perceived value.
Above all, the imperative direct reduces the wordiness.

Steve Hudson , HDK List MVP
Principal Technical Writer
Wright Technologies Pty Ltd (Aus)
EyeSpring - the future of graphics has been created.





-----Original Message-----
From: Jane Carnall
Sent: Friday, January 04, 2002 2:36 AM
To: TECHWR-L
Subject: Should vs. Will, Must and Can


I've noticed while proofreading Javadoc that at least one of the developers
has a habit of phrasing notes (to the end-users, who are developers external
to this company) with "should":
-You should find that the elephant displays as follows:
-This giraffe should be included.
-Where monkeys are present, you should enter Shakespeare as the standard.

In each instance, I believe it would be clearer to use "will", "must", or
"can", instead of "should":
-You will find that the tiger displays as follows:
-This lion must be included.
-Where cheetahs are present, you can use Fastest as the standard.

However, the developer in question has said before that he thinks it's nicer
to say "should" than "must". Is there a nice way to say that I think it's
better to be clear than nice?

He's also sometimes indefinite about "will" (the tiger *should* display like
that *if* everything is working right) and there he may have a point - but I
would say that "will display" follows on from the unsaid "if you've done
everything the way we said" as much as "should display" does.


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