Hypertext for Handling Conceptual Material

Turning 'help' systems and 'browsers' into robust structured-document viewers: the DocBrowser.

Hoffman, Michael. Hypertext Navigation. Articles>Documentation>Web Design>Web Browsers

I Know What You Need to Know: Is that User Centered Documentation?

Quality management is forcing technical communicators to meet the challenge of writing user-centered documentation. Adequate preparatory work would be to categorize potential users according to experience, knowledge, tasks to be performed, and other use-relevant features. Users' requirements and requests should then be incorporated into the document's design.

Bock, Gabriele. TC-FORUM (1999). Articles>Documentation>User Centered Design

I Want to Include the Chapter Number with the Page Number in the Header

If you insist on doing this – and if you do, don't say I didn't warn you! – then the best procedure is as follows.

McGhie, John. Word MVP Site, The (2002). Articles>Word Processing>Document Design>Microsoft Word

IBM User-Centered Design for the Documentation Designer  

The user-centered design of documentation is an aspect of product design that has often been under-emphasized. Difficulties inherent in documentation design include obtaining user, feedback to high-level design objectives; extracting user. feedback specific to a product’s documentation. rather than to the product as a whole; and managing the various resource constraints inherent in product development. IBM User-Centered Design offers a solution to these difficulties by employing a set of user feedback methodologies from which the documentation designer, a member of a multidisciplinary design team, extracts pertinent data to set design objectives and follow through to low-level designs.

Righi, Carol and Lynn VanDyke. STC Proceedings (1996). Articles>User Centered Design>Documentation>Technical Writing

Ideas on Cooperation Between Suppliers and Users Regarding Documentation

Documentation, operators’ manuals, maintenance instructions, etc, can never be perfect and satisfy all users. The organization of the documentation, particularly for large systems, will never suit all users and there will always be some errors present. This means the supplier and the user need to cooperate in various ways to avoid the fatal consequences of errors and misinterpretations, and for the improvement of documentation over time.

Rullgård, Åke. TC-FORUM (2001). Articles>Documentation>User Centered Design

Illegal Colors

Illegal colors are those colors which you can pick on your computer that will not reproduce using traditional CMYK offset printing. For example, open the Apple color wheel. Set the brightness as high as it can be and click on the aqua color at nine o'clock on the wheel. You see that bright, glowy, neon-like color? Isn't it beautiful? Too bad, it's illegal. There is no way that ordinary CMYK inks can reproduce that color. Most people get into illegal color trouble when they pick a color that looks great on the screen, and then have the job printed using process colors. They then complain to the print shop that the job looks dull, that all the brightness is gone. That's the fault of picking illegal colors. You won't get arrested but you will be disappointed in the output. The following is a list of some of the popular desktop publishing program and how they handle illegal colors.

Cohen, Sandee. Design, Typography and Graphics. Design>Graphic Design>Document Design>Color

Illuminating Illustrations  

Too often, illustrations just sit there, taking up space on the page. Here's how to make them work.

Kvern, Olav Martin. Adobe Magazine (1996). Design>Document Design>Graphic Design

Implementation of Medical Research Findings Through Insulin Protocols: Initial Findings from an Ongoing Study of Document Design and Visual Display    

Medical personnel in hospital intensive care units routinely rely on protocols to deliver some types of patient care. These protocol documents are developed by hospital physicians and staff to ensure that standards of care are followed. Thus, the protocol document becomes a _de facto_ standing order, standing in for the physician's judgment in routine situations. This article reports findings from Phase I of an ongoing study exploring how insulin protocols are designed and used in intensive care units to transfer medical research findings into patient care 'best practices.' We developed a taxonomy of document design elements and analyzed 29 insulin protocols to determine their use of these elements. We found that 93% of the protocols used tables to communicate procedures for measuring glucose levels and administering insulin. We further found that the protocols did not adhere well to principles for designing instructions and hypothesized that this finding reflected different purposes for instructions (training) and protocols (standardizing practice).

Longo, Bernadette, Craig Weinert and T. Kenny Fountain. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication (2007). Articles>Document Design>Scientific Communication>Biomedical

Implementing New Desktop Publishing Tools  

When faced with having to respond to increased demands for online documentation using outdated tools, the technical writing staff of Hughes Network Systems (HNS) realized the need for a whole suite of state-of-the art tools and techniques. The challenge lay in convincing management to spend the time and money to acquire them. By coupling an understanding of their own needs as well as those of their customers with an appreciation for the HNS corporate culture, the writers were able to effect a strategy that guaranteed success.

Lipkin, Regina M. STC Proceedings (2001). Articles>Document Design>Software>Case Studies

Import Text Without Surprises

With a little forethought, placing text in InDesign becomes almost effortless.

Adobe (2003). Articles>Document Design>Software>Adobe InDesign

The Importance of Document Design  

One definition of communication is 'the transfer of information from one location to another so that meaning is understood.' In other words, communication is what happens when one person connects to another to share information.

Quesenbery, Whitney. Intercom (2004). Articles>Document Design>Usability

Importing and Exporting Form Data in Acrobat

When using PDF forms, it's possible to export, store and import the data in Form Data Format (FDF). Since an FDF file only includes the form data and not the form itself, it is much smaller and more lightweight that the complete PDF form, making it more efficient to manipulate. This tip explains how to export and import FDF data using Acrobat.

Shea, Dan. PlanetPDF (2007). Articles>Document Design>Forms>Adobe Acrobat

Improving Document Quality Through Customer Visits  

In an effort to improve the quality of our documentation, our Information Development department personally visited over 80 of our customers in 10 different locations across the United States. Our goal was to find out what we needed to do to create documentation that would satisfy our customers' needs. We came up with a process for planning our visits, gathering the information from our customers, implementing their requirements, and increasing communication with them. From the visits, we not only made changes that immediately satisfied our customers, but we created an environment for them to work with us as a team.

Lass, Laura W. and Wendy L. Reed. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>Documentation>Quality>User Centered Design

Improving Documentation Through Customer Feedback: A Case Study  

By soliciting and receiving customer feedback, writers learn how customers use existing documentation and what additional information customers may need. In May 2001, we began a formal process of gathering customer feedback for the IBM WebSphere Commerce Suite product. The first phase of this process involved two main initiatives: creating and promoting a documentation questionnaire for customers; creating and working with an internal test team that acted as customers. Feedback allowed us to determine which information strategies helped customers meet their business needs, and which areas we need to concentrate on in future releases.

Heximer, Erin and Lisa Wu. STC Proceedings (2002). Articles>Documentation>User Centered Design

Improving Documentation with Learning Techniques  

It is important to recognize that because we all differ in our experience and background the learning process is different for each of us. Consequently, in our documentation we should by to put users on an equal footing by, for example, clearly and exactly defining terms we use and including a glossary. We can also put everyone on an equal footing by using 'bridges to understanding,' from analogies, examples, and metaphors to mnemonic strategies. For overall comprehension, we can employ 'frameworks,' from conceptual maps to road maps, that give patterns of meaning to what we say.

Livingston, Dick. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>Documentation>Instructional Design>Glossary

Improving Link Display for Print

It seemed my zeal for linkage had come into conflict with my desire to improve print usability.

Gustafson, Aaron. List Apart, A (2005). Design>Document Design>CSS>Printing

Increasing User Acceptance Of Technical Information in Cross-Cultural Communication    

A significant problem in technical communication is persuading the user that the information is accurate, valid, and useful. All too often, technical communicators treat users as members of their own culture. When authors do consider cultural issues, they often focus on matters such as vocabulary, visuals, and organization. Other strategies, however, can be useful in gaining acceptance of technical information in cross-cultural situations. For example, the communication theory of compliance-gaining offers suggestions for how the technical communicators can adapt the text to enhance user acceptance when communicating to members of their own culture as well as when communicating across cultures. Communicators can use promises, threats, demonstrate positive and negative outcomes, extend friendliness, etc., to develop the text. In this article, I will explain several compliance-gaining strategies authors can use, identify rhetorical strategies they can combine with compliance-gaining strategies, show how these strategies can be effective in a cross-cultural environment by comparing the strategies in two sample cultures, and analyze a brief sample.

Warren, Thomas L. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication (2004). Articles>Documentation>User Centered Design>International

InDesign CS Script Automation

Harness the power of scripts to automate common tasks in InDesign.

Kloskowski, Matt. Mac Design Magazine (2005). Design>Document Design>Software>Adobe InDesign

InDesign CS Scripting Changes

InDesign CS has introduced a large number of changes in scripting. Some things are new, some are simple changes in terminology, and some are changes that will break existing scripts. This is a guide to some of these changes, and is designed primarily to help in moving scripts written for version 2.0.2 to CS.

Stanley, Shane. Scripting Matters (2004). Design>Document Design>Software>Adobe InDesign

InDesign How-To: Adding Custom Sizes to the Page Menu

Of course making custom page sizes if nothing new. But here's a handy InDesign CS trick for adding those custom page sizes to your Page menu so you can call it up at anytime.

Cole, Tim. Creative Pro (2004). Design>Document Design>Prepress>Adobe InDesign

InDesign Killer Tips  

If you approach InDesign as you did your former page layout application, you may be missing out on some features that will make your life easier.

White, Terry. InDesign User Group (2005). Design>Document Design>Software>Adobe InDesign

InDesign Tutorial: Advanced Typographical Controls

Find out how to use Adobe's single line and paragraph composer, hyphenation settings and other typographical controls.

Bruno, Elisabetta. Designorati (2005). Design>Software>Document Design>Adobe InDesign

InDesign Tutorial: Design With Character - Character Style Sheets

Character Style Sheets can be real time savers for designers especially in the creation of long or multi-page documents. Character Style Sheets are simply recorded format that you can then use in your design at will. Consistency is one of the principles that designers must follow. Character Sheets help the designer so he doesn't have to apply manually the same type of formatting over and over again throughout the document.

Bruno, Elisabetta. Designorati (2005). Design>Document Design>Software>Adobe InDesign