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.
Subject:Re. Quick and dirty indexes From:geoff-h -at- MTL -dot- FERIC -dot- CA Date:Fri, 22 Mar 1996 13:38:39 -0600
Henry Friedman asked for recommendations for software that
can create a "quick and dirty" index for a software manual.
Henry, on behalf of your users, let me say: "Don't do it!"
Products do exist for this purpose, including the built-in
indexing function in most word processors, but none of them
takes the place of a human indexer who cares about the user
of the index.
You can create a quick and dirty index completely unaided
just by skimming the text yourself and coming up with two
keywords per page, but I bet your users won't love you for
it. A good index takes time and consideration of the needs
of your users. You can't find that in any software.
--Geoff Hart @8^{)}
geoff-h -at- mtl -dot- feric -dot- ca
Disclaimer: If I didn't commit it in print in one of our
reports, it don't represent FERIC's opinion.