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Subject:Re: acceptable error rates From:Rebecca Phillips <Rebecca -at- QRONUS -dot- CO -dot- IL> Date:Thu, 24 Oct 1996 17:31:57 +0200
>A well-written, understandable document with the occasional typo is
>infinitely preferable to an incomplete, confusing or impenetrable
>one.
That doesn't mean you can't measure documentation errors. It might be
difficult to measure, but it is measurable.
Here we consider documentation errors the same way we consider software
bugs. If someone finds a problem with a document, whether it is a typo
or a customer complaint that the function was explained incorrectly, it
is entered into the Quality Assurance "bug" database. When it is fixed,
we report it to the QA department, and it is removed from the bug list.
In the same way that software has critical, major, and minor bugs, so
does software. I have been in situations where the documentation was
rated as buggy as the software. That sent the company a screaming sign
that they needed to budget more documentation staff.
