RE: TECHWR-L Digest, Vol 80, Issue 10

["Bowes, Rebecca" <Rebecca-Bowes -at- IDEXX -dot- com>]

A Best Practices section doesn't necessarily need to cover best coding practices. It could include recommendations for how best to present your product within that third party app -- guidelines for the interaction, the display, whatever, based on your experience working with other customers. It helps new customers benefit from the experiences of others.

Rb

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Today's Topics:

   1. TECHWR-L Premium Jobs, Events, and Announcements (TechWhirl Admin)
   2. Developer "Best Practices" content (McLauchlan, Kevin)
   3. Re: Developer "Best Practices" content (yehoshua paul)
   4. RE: Developer "Best Practices" content (Erika Yanovich)


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Message: 1
Date: Sun, 10 Jun 2012 13:40:40 -0500
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Message: 2
Date: Sun, 10 Jun 2012 19:24:16 -0400
From: "McLauchlan, Kevin" <Kevin -dot- McLauchlan -at- safenet-inc -dot- com>
To: "techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>
Subject: Developer "Best Practices" content
Message-ID:
	<D1E2C829C5011E4A84DAF8A184DD7CDA020D1681B3 -at- BEL1EXCH02 -dot- amer -dot- sfnt -dot- local>
	
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This is for list members who document software/hardware/firmware products where a customer might be expected to program an app that uses your product, or to integrate your product into a third-party application.
In other words, with your product you supply a developer's toolkit.

An inhabitant of a corner office has decided that our documentation lacks a page or section that would be Best Practices for programmers using our SDK.

>From my point of view, the entire SDK docs are what a customer/developer might want to know.

Some years ago, that portion of the docs included a Tips and Tricks page until I was asked to remove portions that had become outdated. The whole thing went away.

I see no need - and I think even corner-office would agree - for material that any programmer should already know or can find in an O'Reilly book (do they still publish those?), in a C# for Dummies or a Java for Dummies book or similar.

Our headers and sample code are as standardized as we can make them, and include comments relevant to each major language that we support, so there's nothing additional to say about compile options, etc.

What do y'all do on this topic?


-          k


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Message: 3
Date: Mon, 11 Jun 2012 07:20:48 +0300
From: yehoshua paul <yehoshua -dot- p -at- technicalwriting -dot- com>
To: "McLauchlan, Kevin" <Kevin -dot- McLauchlan -at- safenet-inc -dot- com>
Cc: "techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>
Subject: Re: Developer "Best Practices" content
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	<CABz1xA1S7+2M77ygmVu8D8s8qC8ZtAmMrsVSFTYEMUO84sAqeg -at- mail -dot- gmail -dot- com>
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To me the answer is obvious: what do your customers say?
Have you ever gotten any feedback from your customers saying that they need
such a section, or that a Tips and Tricks page would help? Or do they agree
with you and think that such information is redundant for expert users like
them.
If you can find out what your readers want than that is the answer to your
question.

Disclaimer: This is my generic answer for these types of questions. I
personally do not document products where you supply SDK toolkits.

Have a great day,
Yehoshua Paul,
Community contributor and documentation expert
http://technicalwriting.com/



On Mon, Jun 11, 2012 at 2:24 AM, McLauchlan, Kevin <
Kevin -dot- McLauchlan -at- safenet-inc -dot- com> wrote:

> This is for list members who document software/hardware/firmware products
> where a customer might be expected to program an app that uses your
> product, or to integrate your product into a third-party application.
> In other words, with your product you supply a developer's toolkit.
>
> An inhabitant of a corner office has decided that our documentation lacks
> a page or section that would be Best Practices for programmers using our
> SDK.
>
> From my point of view, the entire SDK docs are what a customer/developer
> might want to know.
>
> Some years ago, that portion of the docs included a Tips and Tricks page
> until I was asked to remove portions that had become outdated. The whole
> thing went away.
>
> I see no need - and I think even corner-office would agree - for material
> that any programmer should already know or can find in an O'Reilly book (do
> they still publish those?), in a C# for Dummies or a Java for Dummies book
> or similar.
>
> Our headers and sample code are as standardized as we can make them, and
> include comments relevant to each major language that we support, so
> there's nothing additional to say about compile options, etc.
>
> What do y'all do on this topic?
>
>
> -          k
>
>
> The information contained in this electronic mail transmission
> may be privileged and confidential, and therefore, protected
> from disclosure. If you have received this communication in
> error, please notify us immediately by replying to this
> message and deleting it from your computer without copying
> or disclosing it.
>
>
>
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Message: 4
Date: Mon, 11 Jun 2012 05:13:51 +0000
From: Erika Yanovich <ERIKA_y -at- rad -dot- com>
To: "McLauchlan, Kevin" <Kevin -dot- McLauchlan -at- safenet-inc -dot- com>,
	"techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>
Subject: RE: Developer "Best Practices" content
Message-ID:
	<B2076404CA044A4EAE79FFD4E4D136DC043271BB -at- EXRAD5 -dot- ad -dot- rad -dot- co -dot- il>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

Hi Kevin,
We provide such docs and customers are always asking for lots of examples. Also, they need to know the right sequence of actions to accomplish a typical task and alternative ways of accomplishing the same.
HTH,
Erika


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