*New!* Getting a Book Published and a listing of Literary Agents		Technical Writing Examples Disclaimers/Warnings The computer documentation examples are for the Serf's Up Sales Entry and Customer Marketing Information System. I “invented” this company and system to illustrate the printed documentation/hypertext differences and to provide an example of the work of Second Wave Computing for anyone interested. The system is the work of one person; it is incomplete and probably unworkable. If I wasn't familiar with the way a certain concept is handled in a sales setting (such as “Will Call”), I just ignored it. As far as I know, a system such as this doesn't exist today...but tomorrow or the next day? Who knows. The resources are available now; the technology is available now; pieces of it are in use today. Regardless of the problems with the design/workings of the system, if anyone copies it, I will land on them very hard. Second Wave Computing owns the copyright to both the design and the instructions. Explanation for Help Text/PDF Manual/Imaginary System I discovered that some people, particularly those who access one of these pages (either the help text or the pdf manual) without going through the “introductory” page, actually believe the page they see is real (and complete) documentation for a real system. They thus draw an erroneous conclusion about the documents. So here is an explanation: Things have changed since 1980. On-demand printing is now a reality rather than a catchphrase, so the manual writer no longer needs to saddle every user with the complete 10-pound manual when one specific user needs—and wants— only 10 pages. The concept of chapters is now fully workable, so that the writer can set up as many master pages as necessary to pull together the individual chapters for individual customers. If this system were real, the user for the fake screen/user manual would have a stand-up workstation: he or she would be a cashier. This cashier would not want to use a 10-pound manual in order to look up 10 pages scattered throughout the other 500. Management, who would make the buying decision, would not want the cashier (or by extension, the public) to know that detailed customer information is being bought and/or sold. The system, if the developers were smart, would be sold in modules. The check reader, for example, may or may not be included with the cashier screen. The help text and the software (also in modules) could be set up with a user access filter, which I couldn't do. In addition, the help text, being hypertext, does not need to be isolated for each function, since the users access only the function/instructions/information in which they are interested. Therefore, the manual contains just the information the users (cashiers) need to know in order to operate the sales screen and active function keys they see. The help text, on the other hand, contains more system-wide information, as it would in real life. The modules that the cashier would not access have the barest overview in order to show what they were intended for. These, in a real system, would be accessible only if the user sign-on contained permission to access the modules to which the explanation applies. Printed Version for the Computer User Manual The printed version is in a PDF file readable with Adobe Acrobat Reader Version 3.01 or higher. If you do not have Adobe Acrobat Reader and want to download the PDF file, you can download the reader from here or go to adobe.com View the PDF file here. The Hypertext User Help Text The Hypertext Help Text for our imaginary system is also a fake, but very painful to set up in html.

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New!

Getting a Book Published and a listing of Literary Agents

Technical Writing Examples

Disclaimers/Warnings

The computer documentation examples are for the Serf's Up Sales Entry and Customer Marketing Information System. I “invented” this company and system to illustrate the printed documentation/hypertext differences and to provide an example of the work of Second Wave Computing for anyone interested.

The system is the work of one person; it is incomplete and probably unworkable.
If I wasn't familiar with the way a certain concept is handled in a sales setting (such as “Will Call”), I just ignored it.

As far as I know, a system such as this doesn't exist today...but tomorrow or the next day? Who knows. The resources are available now; the technology is available now; pieces of it are in use today.

Regardless of the problems with the design/workings of the system, if anyone copies it, I will land on them very hard. Second Wave Computing owns the copyright to both the design and the instructions.

Explanation for Help Text/PDF Manual/Imaginary System

I discovered that some people, particularly those who access one of these pages (either the help text or the pdf manual) without going through the “introductory” page, actually believe the page they see is real (and complete) documentation for a real system. They thus draw an erroneous conclusion about the documents. So here is an explanation:

Things have changed since 1980. On-demand printing is now a reality rather than a catchphrase, so the manual writer no longer needs to saddle every user with the complete 10-pound manual when one specific user needs—and wants— only 10 pages.
The concept of chapters is now fully workable, so that the writer can set up as many master pages as necessary to pull together the individual chapters for individual customers.
If this system were real, the user for the fake screen/user manual would have a stand-up workstation: he or she would be a cashier. This cashier would not want to use a 10-pound manual in order to look up 10 pages scattered throughout the other 500.
Management, who would make the buying decision, would not want the cashier (or by extension, the public) to know that detailed customer information is being bought and/or sold.
The system, if the developers were smart, would be sold in modules. The check reader, for example, may or may not be included with the cashier screen.
The help text and the software (also in modules) could be set up with a user access filter, which I couldn't do. In addition, the help text, being hypertext, does not need to be isolated for each function, since the users access only the function/instructions/information in which they are interested.

Therefore, the manual contains just the information the users (cashiers) need to know in order to operate the sales screen and active function keys they see. The help text, on the other hand, contains more system-wide information, as it would in real life. The modules that the cashier would not access have the barest overview in order to show what they were intended for. These, in a real system, would be accessible only if the user sign-on contained permission to access the modules to which the explanation applies.

Printed Version for the Computer User Manual

The printed version is in a PDF file readable with Adobe Acrobat Reader Version 3.01 or higher. If you do not have Adobe Acrobat Reader and want to download the PDF file, you can download the reader from here or go to adobe.com

View the PDF file here.

The Hypertext User Help Text

The Hypertext Help Text for our imaginary system is also a fake, but very painful to set up in html.

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