Software Documentation specialists

Introduction

Software documentation is basically the written text that explains the functioning and uses of the computer software. Documentation is an important part of software engineering and these days have becomes a full fledged discipline on its own with a wide range of opportunities available to anyone interested in this career.

Types of documentation

There are four important types of documentation in software industry :

1. Architecture/Design This provides the overview of software. These documents do not provide information on running or using a particular routine, or even why that particular routine exists in the form that it does, but it merely lays out the general requirements that would motivate the existence of such a routine.

2. Technical documentation This is the most widely used or known term in this area and involves documentation of code, algorithms, interfaces, and APIs. It is important for the code documents to be thorough, but not so detailed that it becomes difficult to maintain them. Tools such as Doxygen, javadoc, ROBODoc, POD or TwinText can be used to auto-generate the code documents. They help in extracting the comments from the source code and create reference manuals in text or HTML formats.

3. End User or User documentation is written specifically for users of the software and is basically a manual for the end-user, system administrators and support staff. The user documentation describes each feature of the program, and assists the user in using these features. A good user document should provide thorough troubleshooting assistance.

4. Marketing type of documentation is used to provide promotional briefs and special features which can be used as advertising material.

Technical Writers

Most software documentation is written by technical writers, employees who specialize in the field. The software documentation writers research and write the instructional guides, online and desktop help guides, reference manuals, and job aids for computer software. The documentation ranges from descriptions of complicated systems software installations to an on-screen help guide for a word-processing program. The basic approach is to create documents that are clear and concise for beginners and detailed enough to be useful for advanced users. Usually tech writers have to prepare documentation before the product is released and thus they get to use the product much before most people and this sometimes help them to find problems and bugs which may have gone unnoticed.

Opportunities

Large organizations usually have a full documentation department with several levels of software documentation writers. Those at the top are the senior writers. In addition to writing documents, senior writers may manage the activities of several other writers. Then there are Copy editors who check the text for grammar, correct spelling, information accuracy, and punctuation.. Depending on their technical knowledge, copy editors may check the technical content of the document. But In smaller companies, the software documentation writer may perform all these tasks by himself. The career moves from junior to senior level writing and the complexity of the job also increases and one may get to move from writing simple manuals to sophisticated demos using very powerful tools.

Training and Requirements

To become a technical writer or a software documentation specialist, one should have a bachelor's degree in technical writing, communications, journalism, or English. Some companies also look for an experience in programs and programming languages, such as RoboHelp or XML, that are typically used by software documentation writers. In addition to these, working knowledge of book design, page layout, and readability requirements are an added asset. Writers Block (TWB) in Bangalore (India) and USA based STC (Society for Technical Communications) is the largest professional body of professionals interested in tech writing.