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My new boss (huzzah!) has all the Right Feelings about technical
documentation... which is to say, on most points, he agrees with me.
He's actively interested in improving our documentation, which is
great.
There's one area that I'm not so sure of what current Good Practice
is. Our documents are very graphic intensive... our format is
2-columns, one for text, the other for graphics, of which 3 fit on a
page.
The question I have is... do we need text references to all these
pictures? usually, the picture needed for the text is directly
opposite the text. In the documents I've inherited, they only used
references to graphics for pictures that weren't directly opposite the
text. My boss wants in-text references to *every* picture, even
things like an over-all shot of the machine with callouts defining the
parts of the machine and location of controls that are referred to
frequently in the general text.
I have no real problem with putting in references to every graphic,
but I'm not sure it's required. or is it?
-Becca
--
Becca Price
beccap -at- rust -dot- net
"Wisdom begins when you discover the difference between 'That doesn't
make sense' and "I don't understand.' "
Children of God, by Mary Doria Russell; pg 142-143
