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Subject:Re: Additional new features From:"Janet Swisher" <jmswisher -at- gmail -dot- com> To:"Ronald Schwarz" <RSchwarz -at- cosmocom -dot- com> Date:Mon, 6 Oct 2008 12:08:59 -0500
On Mon, Oct 6, 2008 at 11:48 AM, Ronald Schwarz <RSchwarz -at- cosmocom -dot- com> wrote:
> My Product manager wrote the official Documentation Plan for the new product release. He included What Additional Features are Available in one of the user documents. In my ten years of experience in other companies, this was put either in the Release Notes or the installation document.
>
> What are some good reasons for not putting such a section in a user document? The main output will be online help. The print version will be a secondary distribution. It seems this "what's new" section will hardly ever be read by someone using online help to solve a problem in the use of the product.
>
I can think of reasons for putting it in, rather than reasons for
leaving it out. The end user might not be the person who decided to
get the upgrade, and might not be the person who installed it. Even if
they do know what's new, they may want an introduction to using those
new features. One way to put the information in front of the user
would be to design the software to bring up that topic the first time
the user starts the new version (with a "Don't show me this again"
check box"). Even if it's too late to add that, a "What's New in 2.0"
section with links to the topics that actually describe the new
features would save the end user from having to guess where those
topics are.
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