TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
> Why do they need to know XML, if the software creates the documents for
> them?
Excellent question! When everything goes well, clients don't need strong
XML, they just need a high-level understanding of the functional flow, which
includes the government body's XML Web service. When things don't go well,
we might expect a client to troubleshoot, and that might include finding a
piece of data in an XML doc.
> Why does your software create corrupt data? Sorry if I'm
> misrepresenting your product; you didn't give us much to go on.
Our software doesn't corrupt the data, but the Web service that the
government agency implemented is still ironing out bugs. As a result, some
XML docs that our software receives from the government agency are invalid
or ill-formed (or whatever the opposite of well-formed is!)
>
> Sell them consulting! Does your company have heavyweight domain
> expertise? If not, then consider hiring some. Get involved with the
> regulatory body, then *you* can inform your client when changes are
> coming.
>
Other people here are looking at stiffening the company's resolve and
charging for the hours of support provided. They're also getting more
involved in the regulatory body. Both good ideas!
> Now I'm really curious: What heavily regulated industry allows
> important documents to travel by email?
I was referring to my end-user docs, not the XML docs -- I throw them
together, and support emails them to clients.
---
You are currently subscribed to techwr-l as:
archive -at- raycomm -dot- com
To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-techwr-l-obscured -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com
Send administrative questions to ejray -at- raycomm -dot- com -dot- Visit http://www.raycomm.com/techwhirl/ for more resources and info.
