reviewing <ptui>

["Carnall, Jane" <Jane -dot- Carnall -at- compaq -dot- com>]

Before the holidays, I sent a document to a developer (he was responsible
for a large part of its technical content: I reformatted, restructured,
corrected, and edited his text). He has returned the document with a couple
of chapters (long ones) unreviewed, saying that he doesn't have time to
review any more of it, and I shouldn't have "made so many changes". (He's
copied this reply to our project manager. I have discussed this situation
with my departmental manager, who pointed out that the developer is
responsible for what he's written and suggested that I should just draw a
line under it.) 

The developer and I have already briefly discussed this issue. The developer
sees no problem with me reformatting and some mild restructuring, accepts
that the corrections were necessary, but rejects most of the editing as
trivial. (English is not his first language, and IMO the edits I made *were*
necessary, though I agree that his text is mostly comprehensible, though
tough going, without them.)

Unless I can persuade his project manager to convince him to give some more
of his time to reviewing the document (which is unlikely, we're on a very
tight deadline), I see no real alternative but to return the text in those
sections to his original, unedited version: without his reviews, I can't be
absolutely certain that the edits I made didn't change the meaning
technically. (Some of his sentences were a little convoluted, and while I
made the best determination of his meaning possible, there's always the
possibility of error.) However, I'd like to do so with some pithy yet polite
comment that suggests that my edits were *not* trivial, and his refusal to
review has reduced the effectiveness of the documentation. Any offers?

Jane Carnall
Technical Writer, Compaq, UK
Unless stated otherwise, these opinions are mine, and mine alone.


^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Develop HTML-based Help with Macromedia Dreamweaver! (STC Discount.)
**NEW DATE/LOCATION!** January 16-17, 2001, New York, NY.
http://www.weisner.com/training/dreamweaver_help.htm or 800-646-9989.

Sponsored by DigiPub Solutions Corp, producers of PDF 2001 
Conference East, June 4-5, Baltimore/Washington D.C. area.
http://www.pdfconference.com or toll-free 877/278-2131. 

---
You are currently subscribed to techwr-l as: archive -at- raycomm -dot- com
To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-techwr-l-obscured -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com
Send administrative questions to ejray -at- raycomm -dot- com -dot-  Visit 
http://www.raycomm.com/techwhirl/ for more resources and info.