Task: Develop Product Documentation |  |
Because product documentation continues to be used after a development effort ends, it is important to ensure that the features developed within a particular release are clearly documented while the functionality is still fresh in the minds of team members.
Disciplines: Deployment
Purpose
The purpose of this task is to document enough information about the features that were developed in a particular release to be useful to customers throughout the life of the product.
Relationships
Roles | Primary Performer: Technical Writer | Additional Performers: Developer Product Owner
Outputs | Product Documentation
Main Description
Development team members sometimes take documentation for granted, or do not give it enough consideration. However, after a product is delivered, customers who pay for the system and for support often do not have enough information to effectively manage the product. If a technical writer is made available to a development team, that role often takes the burden off the team for developing the formal product documentation and for ensuring that it is in the correct format and business language. If a technical writer is not available, the development team and product owner must make every effort to create enough documentation to ensure that the features that have been developed for each release are understood and can be communicated effectively by the paying customer to their stakeholders. Delivering a professionally developed product requires that a development team provide the customer with accurate, detailed, and comprehensive product documentation.
Steps
Identify features of current release
Every release will contain a set of features that were developed during the preceding feature development sprint or iterations. This list should drive the table of contents of the product documentation. It also is possible that some nonfunctional requirements should be documented as well. While the product documentation will not be used directly as user documentation, it will become the basis for the user documentation. That foundation of information is why this step is important.
Document each feature
Write a comprehensive description of each feature and include appropriate screen shots as well as relevant information about how the feature was developed.
Review product documentation with stakeholders
Schedule a review session with key stakeholders to ensure that the product documentation is adequate and that it contains the level of detail needed by the product customer. If more detail is required, elicit one or more examples from the stakeholders that show how they would like the documentation to be prepared.
Update product documentation as necessary
Based on the outcome of the review session, update the product documentation so that it can receive the proper approval on delivery.
Deliver product documentation
For this release, deliver the final product documentation to the customer and key stakeholders. Obtain their formal approval if necessary.
This program and the accompanying materials are made available under the Eclipse Public License V1.0, which accompanies this distribution. EPF Copyright.