FWD: Government Contracts, Standards, and Online Help

Subject: FWD: Government Contracts, Standards, and Online Help
From: TECHWR-L Administrator <admin -at- techwr-l -dot- com>
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Date: Fri, 12 Jun 2009 08:21:50 -0600

Forwarded anonymously on request--please reply to list only. Thanks!
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Hello list,

In the world of government contracting, sometimes you not only have to
deal with

the government but with other government contractors. In my
department, we write

installation guides, software release notices, user manuals, and
online help for

desktop applications and web applications.

Another government contractor is in charge of documentation standards
for this government

agency and therefore we are forced to use the Information Mapping
style for our install guides,

user manuals, and software release notices. We were not happy when

this was imposed on us almost 9 months ago; however, we could deal
with it. The government

contractor reviews all of these documents and writes tickets against
the docs if the standard

is not followed.


The installation guides, user manuals, and software release notices
are created using

Word 2003 and the Information Mapping FS Pro utility. Online help is
created using RoboHelp.


Last week, these standards were changed and the entire Tech Pubs staff
is now very unhappy.

The change is for all of our online help to exactly mirror a user
manual in the Information

Mapping style, the same organization, the same fonts, the same tables,
etc.

I am in need of arguments to bolster our position that this change is
not necessary and

would be detrimental to our users. In case you were wondering, No, we
were not consulted

about this change. Thank you. Anonymous




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Forwarded anonymously on request--please reply to list only. Thanks!



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