Where Did All the Documentation Go?

Documentation is a huge cost factor in software development, and companies are looking for ways to trim costs. If you cut back on product doc and customers don't complain, there's a temptation to keep cutting. Eventually you end up with software engineers writing bits of doc because all the tech writers were laid off, but there'll be one guy who didn't get laid off who has to work like heck to wire it all up and make it continue to look like professionally written doc.

assertTrue (2009). Articles>Documentation>Programming>Technical Writing

Docs Aren't Code

In the world of development, the need to track bug reports and enhancement requests are a given. But they're not generally required for documentation, in the way they are for code Quite the reverse. For documentation, bug reports and enhancement requests provide little benefit, and generally impede progress. This post compares documentation and code, showing why bug reports and enhancement requests are so vital to the code base, and at the same time why those reasons simply do not apply to documentation.

Armstrong, Eric. Sun Microsystems (2008). Articles>Documentation>Programming>Technical Writing