RE: Compare and Contrast Doc Group Performance -- What'saWorld-ClassDoc Group Look Like?

Subject: RE: Compare and Contrast Doc Group Performance -- What'saWorld-ClassDoc Group Look Like?
From: Fred Ridder <docudoc -at- hotmail -dot- com>
To: "McLauchlan, Kevin" <kevin -dot- mclauchlan -at- safenet-inc -dot- com>, <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>
Date: Thu, 13 Mar 2008 14:17:10 -0400


Kevin McLauchlan wrote (in small part):
> OK, so if that effort now breaks, is it because the documentalists were
> not performing as well as the code-monkeys? Or is it because, maybe,
> there are important differences between the two processes that the glib
> equation didn't cover? Other? What if it goes the other way? What if
> the documentalists seem to shine on all metrics, compared to the
> code-monkeys? Are the code-monkeys a bunch of lazy, incompetent simians?
> Or is it possible that the metrics aren't illuminating the right things?
> Apples and iguanas?

A key difference between the two situations is that the output produced
by the code monkeys is interpreted by a computer chip (in the case of
an application) or by some software application running on a computer chip.
In either case, the interpretation of the code monkeys' work product is
ideally deterministic, or at least relatively predictable and repeatable. In
other words, it generally works or it doesn't; and if it doesn't work, it
usually will fail in the same way given the same set of cirrcumstances.
(It's the problem of duplicating the *exact* circumstances that can
make troubleshooting, debugging, and root cause analysis so difficult,
but that's a whole different discussion.)

But documentation is interpreted by human beings, each of whom may
interpret the same work product in slightly (or majorly) different ways.
How can one objectively gauge the "correctness" of a document when
different people get slightly different meanings from the same sequence
of words (something we see on this list all the time)? And the
interpretation problem is only compounded if the document was not
carefully and skillfully written in the first place. The writer may have a
correct understanding of the facts, and may write about them in a way
that makes sense to himself, but that is no guarantee that anyone else
will come to exactly the same understanding upon reading those words.

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References:
RE: Compare and Contrast Doc Group Performance -- What's aWorld-Class Doc Group Look Like?: From: John Rosberg
Re: Compare and Contrast Doc Group Performance -- What's aWorld-ClassDoc Group Look Like?: From: Gene Kim-Eng
RE: Compare and Contrast Doc Group Performance -- What's aWorld-ClassDoc Group Look Like?: From: Fred Ridder
Re: Compare and Contrast Doc Group Performance -- What's aWorld-ClassDoc Group Look Like?: From: jlshaeffer
RE: Compare and Contrast Doc Group Performance -- What's aWorld-ClassDoc Group Look Like?: From: Fred Ridder
RE: Compare and Contrast Doc Group Performance -- What'saWorld-ClassDoc Group Look Like?: From: McLauchlan, Kevin

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