DOCUMENTATION DEVELOPMENT LIFE CYCLE DDLC For Technical Writers

DOCUMENTATION DEVELOPMENT LIFE CYCLE (DDLC) For Technical Writers PPT by Saritha

DOCUMENTATION DEVELOPMENT LIFE CYCLE (DDLC) The Technical Writers follow a development cycle for creating documentation, which is known as Documentation Development Life Cycle. The Documentation Development Life Cycle (DDLC) maps with the SDLC such that the entire product team works in close coordination to complete the development, adhering to a common project schedule. Modeled on SDLC, the DDLC has somewhat similar stages as that of SDLC. However, the duration of stages varies according to the difference in availability schedule of inputs for various stages. Let us begin with taking a look at the stages in the DDLC.

STAGES IN DDLC stages include 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Gathering Requirements Design Content Developing Review/Edit/Proof-reading Publish Maintenance publish

1. Understand Requirements § Understand the Product or Application to be developed § Gain an understanding of the Domain or Subject Matter § Understand Client Requirements for Documentation § Study Legacy Documentation and Writing Style Guides used by the Client § Provide Content Consulting § Propose Documentation Deliverables and Tools to be used § Prepare Effort Estimate § Propose Team Size and Composition

2. Design §Prepare Templates and Stylesheets §Prepare an Outline or the Table of Contents for documents to be created §Create Content Strategy for Single-sourcing or writing for multiple user roles §Create a Documentation Project Schedule

3. Content Developing §Gather Information: Read Design Specifications , Interview Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) §Create Content Drafts §Create and Insert Graphics §Format the Content §Generate Output(s)

4. Review §Language Review §SME or Technical Review §Client POC’s Review

5. Publish §Integrate the Documentation with the Product or Application §Send for final publishing or distribution

6. Maintenance Maintaining a document is vital as no software is perfect. There will always be multiple versions and rollbacks to previous versions as well. It is important that the technical communicator or the SME keeps the content updated through it all.