Re: Word to the wise

["Bill Swallow" <techcommdood -at- gmail -dot- com>]

I always accept everything people give me and thank them, and always
explain why I need more if what they gave me is insufficient (I never
couch it that way with them, though).

I had the same exact battle you fought, though it was over giving
writers direct write access to the product source code. You can
imagine the opposition it was initially met with. But, by detailing
how we would work, and showing them that we'd follow their exact
process for check-ins and quality control. It also helped to show them
a flow diagram of the two workflows (the desired was 1/3 as complex)
and also showed the # of hours spent the old way vs. the # hours it
would have cut from that process. We got the access, and we made good
on not breaking the code.

Well, I actually broke the build once, doing something completely
unrelated. But that happens with Devs a lot too. My punishment? I was
awarded "The Fish", a trophy of a singing trout dressed like Elvis. It
floats around from person to person as boneheadded mistakes are made.
It was actually quite an honor winning the fish. :)

On Tue, Feb 26, 2008 at 2:57 PM, Pro TechWriter
<pro -dot- techwriter -at- gmail -dot- com> wrote:
> Mr. Developer: "It's too much of a risk to give you access to the app. Just
> document the screen shots."
>
> Tech Writer: "I'm sorry, I can't validate what I write, so I can't be sure
> of the accuracy of the documentation. I need access to the app, if nothing
> more than to look at the windows, so I can document the app. "

-- 
Bill Swallow
HATT List Owner
WWP-Users List Owner
Senior Member STC, TechValley Chapter
STC Single-Sourcing SIG Manager
http://techcommdood.blogspot.com
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