Product Documentation vs. Training Guides
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AudreyLange
- Propeller Head
- Posts: 33
- Joined: Mon May 19, 2014 9:01 am
Product Documentation vs. Training Guides
At my company, we have a department for Technical Communications (Help product documentation, both print and online) and a department for Curriculum Technical Writing (training guides used in training sessions). Both teams use MadCap Flare, but in very different ways. I've been tasked by management with looking into the feasibility of combining our Help source files with the Training source files, to share common content like introductory info and procedures, using lots of condition tags. There are plenty of risks and considerations with this, but my FIRST step here is research around industry standards... what are other companies and education departments doing? Is it common to share source files between product documentation and training materials like this? If anybody would be willing to provide specific details on your company and how the product documentation and training content is stored/produced, that would be a big help to me at this stage. Thanks in advance!
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ChoccieMuffin
- Senior Propellus Maximus
- Posts: 2650
- Joined: Wed Apr 14, 2010 8:01 am
- Location: Surrey, UK
Re: Product Documentation vs. Training Guides
People who prepare training material are in a completely different team to those who prepare user documentation.
In your circumstance, where both teams use Flare, could you use a "globals" project that contains the stuff that both teams need, and then import the project into both teams' Flare projects?
In your circumstance, where both teams use Flare, could you use a "globals" project that contains the stuff that both teams need, and then import the project into both teams' Flare projects?
Started as a newbie with Flare 6.1, now using Flare 2024r2.
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Request features at https://www.madcapsoftware.com/feedback ... quest.aspx
Re: Product Documentation vs. Training Guides
If both the product and training materials are for the same audience, then I think it would make a lot of sense for the folks producing those materials to collaborate and share content.
At the very least, you should be aware of what materials each other are producing. I don't use the same tools as the team who produce training material, but we share our content for re-use where appropriate.
Presumably there will be a lot of common content, and it's really just the presentation of the content that might be slightly different (with training being more structured).
In Flare's help, you have e-learning "Tutorials" which are structured like training courses: https://help.madcapsoftware.com/flare20 ... orials.htm
At the very least, you should be aware of what materials each other are producing. I don't use the same tools as the team who produce training material, but we share our content for re-use where appropriate.
Presumably there will be a lot of common content, and it's really just the presentation of the content that might be slightly different (with training being more structured).
In Flare's help, you have e-learning "Tutorials" which are structured like training courses: https://help.madcapsoftware.com/flare20 ... orials.htm