Re: Striving To Increase The Page Count Was: Estimation of the number of pages...

Subject: Re: Striving To Increase The Page Count Was: Estimation of the number of pages...
From: Tony Markos <ajmarkos -at- yahoo -dot- com>
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>
Date: Sat, 8 Jan 2005 13:47:41 -0800 (PST)



--- David Neeley (responding to Tony Markos statement
that in one of the documentation projects that he was
most proud of, it took him almost three weeks to
compose nine smaller size paragraphs) wrote:

Tony,

In the shops in which I have been, you would not
*last* three weeks if the result constituted "nine
smaller size paragraphs." Few people today have that
kind of leisure or budget.

Tony Markos responds:

Please explain to me the relationship between word
count and value.

If there is none (and you kind of stated such latter
in your original posting), then what is wrong with
taking 3 weeks to compose nine paragraphs, if it
delivers the value.

Note: On the project in question, my predecessors had
spent many a million dollar and failed to deliver the
required value. One of my first steps was to trash
alot of legacy documentation.

David Neely:

> Personally, I believe that documentation is often
> much too long
> because of a lack of time to edit properly...sort of
> an "I apologize
> for the length of this letter, for I did not have
> time to make it
> short" sort of thing (variously attributed).

Tony Markos:

True, but just as common, the saying "If you can not
dazzle them with you brilliance [short, but essential
documentation], baffle them with your BS" applies.

David Neely:

> In fact, I have rarely been part of a doc project
> that had sufficient
> time that there was little rush at the end of the
> release cycle.
> Usually, it's a mad scramble to get everything
> covered that absolutely
> must be included, let alone the time to edit and
> polish. Perhaps your
> experience has been different?

Tony Markos:

I often have to deal with legacy documentation of some
sort. I can not think of situation in which I did not
have to throw away alot - sometimes upwards of 95% -
of this documentation.







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References:
Re: Striving To Increase The Page Count Was: Estimation of the number of pages...: From: David Neeley

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