Collaborative Technical Writing • Description: “In this session, attendees explore using agile collaborative techniques to capture and document technical content” • Type of Session: Case Study • For almost a decade, customers requested maintenance and operational guidance and after several attempt, the complexity and scope of the content still prevented successful publication. Additionally priorities focused money, time and resources on customer’s immediate needs, such as deployment & configuration guides, hardware manuals and knowledge base articles. Facing this challenge a year ago, we decided it was time to “think outside the box”. How could we cut the costs and schedule without impacting technical accuracy, product coverage and a professional look/feel? Instead of the traditional method ‐ hiring a technical writer, expecting them to ramp up on the technology in a short time and track down SMEs…, we took a leaf out of product developments playbook. Using agile and collaborative writing techniques, we pulled SMEs = engineers, product developer and others into a room and in ONE week we wrote and published a 200+ page book! In the 5 months since our first guide shipped we’ve had 5,000+ downloads and our second book was downloaded 500 times in the first week. AND, the content is current, deeply technical and accurate. By the end of 2015, we will have 6 guides (10,000+ pages of quality technical content) available on demand for customers. PLUS we will have ePubs and Print of Demand through a number of channels. As the high tech industry slashes technical publications teams, new models are required. This one works!

Jeanne Lewis: Collaborative Technical Writing

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Page 1: Jeanne Lewis: Collaborative Technical Writing

Collaborative Technical Writing• Description: “In this session, attendees explore using agile collaborative techniques to capture and document

technical content”

• Type of Session: Case Study

• For almost a decade, customers requested maintenance and operational guidance and after several attempt, the complexity and scope of the content still prevented successful publication. Additionally priorities focused money, time and resources on customer’s immediate needs, such as deployment & configuration guides, hardware manuals and knowledge base articles.

Facing this challenge a year ago, we decided it was time to “think outside the box”. How could we cut the costs and schedule without impacting technical accuracy, product coverage and a professional look/feel?

Instead of the traditional method ‐ hiring a technical writer, expecting them to ramp up on the technology in a short time and track down SMEs…, we took a leaf out of product developments playbook. Using agile and collaborative writing techniques, we pulled SMEs = engineers, product developer and others into a room and in ONE week we wrote and published a 200+ page book!

In the 5 months since our first guide shipped we’ve had 5,000+ downloads and our second book was downloaded 500 times in the first week. AND, the content is current, deeply technical and accurate. By the end of 2015, we will have 6 guides (10,000+ pages of quality technical content) available on demand for customers. PLUS we will have ePubs and Print of Demand through a number of channels.

As the high tech industry slashes technical publications teams, new models are required. This one works!

Collaborative Technical Writing

• Presenters:– Jeanne Lewis, Project Manager,

F5 Networks, Seattle WA• In the role of Test Manager, Release Manager and Project Manager, Jeanne’s spent close to 20 years in high tech with industry giants like Microsoft, F5 and Adobe.

– Adam Hyde, Founder and CEO Book Sprints, San Francisco, CA• Adam leads a development team producing an innovative Open Source platform for the production, processing, peer review, and publishing of Open Access manuscripts at the Public Library of Science . Adam, the founder of Book Sprints, regularly presents at a conferences including events in the Netherlands, Sweden, the USA, Germany, and the UK.