CRDSS_Task2-12-1_DocumentationCoordinationYear2Efforts

• Title: CRDSS Task 1.12-1 - Documentation Coordination - Documentation Coordination Year 2 Efforts
• Description: This task memorandum describes the documentation coordination efforts for Year 2 of CRDSS.
• Decision Support - Doc Type: Task Memorandum
• Date: 1/3/1997
• DSS Category: DMI Utilities
• DSS: Colorado River
• Basin: Colorado Mainstem
• Contract/PO #: C153658, C153727, C153752
• Grant Type: Non-Reimbursable
• Bill Number: SB92-87, HB93-1273, SB94-029, HB95-1155, SB96-153, HB97-008
• Prepared By: Riverside Technology inc.

that this procedure would be more cost-effective than trying to maintain two separate versions of the
documentation. All Word documents that are in the Users? and Developers? Manuals are therefore able
to be converted to HTML. Note that not all documentation in the Users? and Developers? Manuals are
identified as on-line documentation deliverables (e.g., Preface, Introduction); however, where the on-line
documentation had an obvious gap, some hard-copy sections have been put on-line.
Bigger implications of the above procedure are:
?
Since the master copy of on-line documentation is in Word, it is likely that a support staff
will be involved in all future updates to documentation. This need assumes that the
documentation is updated within a group (such as RTi) that maintains strong revision control
on documents. If the documentation is updated on an individual basis, then standards
implementation may suffer. Therefore, future updates to documentation should include
sufficient budget for mark-ups by authors and revisions and document regeneration by
support staff. Additionally, the documentation in the doc/html directory for software is no
longer the master copy, but is still the copy to be carried around with a software product.
?
Rapid updates to documentation are not as easy to implement and therefore both product
(e.g., software) updates and documentation updates should be coordinated on more of a
release date mode so that the documentation and product will agree.
The final results of the hard copy documentation update are the CRDSS Users? and CRDSS Developers?
manuals, each of which is in a three-ring binder. Each major section is tabbed and all sections have page
numbers unique to the section (e.g., ?Intro-1?), thus allowing easy updates and additions to the manuals.
Subtask 3. Prepare a memorandum describing available on-line and hard copy database
documentation for Year 2.
This subtask involves the preparation of this memorandum. The contents of the on-line documenation
are discussed under Subtask 1. Because the hard copy and on-line documentation so closely agree, most
of the on-line documenation is also available in the CRDSS Users? Manual and the CRDSS Developers?
Manual.
3.0 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
The following recommendations are made for consideration now that the CRDSS on-line and hard copy
documentation is in final review:
?
Now that documentation standards seem to have evolved sufficiently, it should be stressed to all
those doing documentation within CRDSS that there are standards that should be followed and that
there are tools that make documentation conversion possible. The task leader for this task should be
prepared to enforce the standards and work with the CRDSS management team when a change to the
standards is necessary. The task leader for Year 2 has a technical background, however, a support
staff person with a knowledge of on-line documentation implementation and conversion techniques
could take on the role of task leader.

?
Document master copies should continue to be maintained in Microsoft Word, using the GTHTML
package to convert to HTML. Therefore, accept additional up-front costs in maintaining documents
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a320/taskmems/ 2-12-01.doc 01/03/97