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TWB is not only in the forefront of delivering solutions to customers, we do so on the back of a deep understanding of domains and technologies. We understand and observe best practices in Documentation Outsourcing and Document Development Technologies, including Single Sourcing, XML and DITA. TWB’s expertise spans across industries that include, IT Products and Outsourcing, ITES, Financial Services, Aerospace, Defense, Ship Building, Manufacturing and Discrete & Process Industries.
Documentation Outsourcing
Offshore Development of Technical Documentation: For several years, organizations have effectively outsourced their business tasks to external organizations. When business is outsourced to a company located in another country, it is called offshoring. Although outsourcing is a well-established business model, the success rate for outsourcing and offshoring documentation has always been debatable. This document addresses the reasons and problems faced while offshoring documents. It also explores the pointers which, when addressed, can effectively resolve the issues. Study shows that the offshoring failures are more relevant to complex product development environments with tight schedules, where many changes are incorporated preceding the deadlines.
ROI for Technical Documentation Outsourcing: Outsourcing business services is a regular process in the present global high-tech world. This business has grown to encompass knowledge processes along with business processes in recent years. Outsourcing of technical documentation is proving to be an investment that has high potential returns. However to encash this potential, every outsourcer needs to understand what he stands to gain eventually before implementing the strategy of outsourcing. This White Paper tries to draw attention to the implementation of the ROI concept in technical documentation outsourcing and list the various subsequent returns. It also highlights some of the factors that drive outsourcing technical documentation as well.
Selecting an Outsourcing partner for Technical Documentation: Outsourcing of technical documentation is a process of vertical disintegration of the value chain, where some phases or even the whole production process is contracted out to service providers. It is critical that a company spends the mandate time and effort short listing and contracting business modules to efficient technical documentation providers. The process of selecting an outsourcing partner for technical documentation calls for a strategy, like in any other business situation. If not considered appropriately, the organization can go through a colossal wastage of time and investment with disappointing results. This Paper analyzes and provides useful information on the process of selecting vendors or partners for outsourcing technical documentation work to, for such companies
Drivers of Technical Documentation Outsourcing: To be successful in an increasingly competitive economic environment, decisions to outsource technical documentation activities are essentially driven by factors related to costs of production, distribution and productivity. Though these are the major drivers of technical documentation outsourcing, there are also other factors influencing the decisions of the companies’ top benches. This White Paper examines some of the drivers or determinants of the technical documentation outsourcing from the client’s perspective and focuses on the client’s key strategic decisions regarding outsourcing of technical documentation.

Documentation Development Techniques
Program Management Process for Technical Documentation: A program is a specific undertaking to achieve a number of objectives. Every program develops from a unique business opportunity before moving into the implementation of projects or multiple production units. Program Management is the management of projects towards a specific objective. Improper program management can cause delays in handing over the deliverables, cost escalation and loss of credibility among stakeholders. This Paper provides some pointers on better management of Technical Documentation programs.
Estimation Techniques for Technical Documentation: To estimate the effort for a technical document has always been a challenge for writers. This stage is very crucial, since it affects the high-level planning and subsequent budgeting for a particular project. Although it is endeavored to arrive at an accurate estimate initially, many unanticipated factors and risks could affect the overall health of a project. There are few accepted standards/methods for estimating efforts for document deliverables and the accuracy of an estimate could make or break a project. Many projects are shelved due to errors in estimation, which have led to disputes. Some have resulted in doubling the effort, or even over shooting the overall planned schedule, entailing compromises in the quality of deliverables. This document primarily looks into why estimates go wrong and what factors need to be considered while making an estimate for a given document. It also addresses and discusses a few of the viable estimating techniques and their implications and also the issues that are often overlooked during speculation.
Advanced Testing Techniques for User Documents: The credibility of any organization depends on the user documents that accompany its products. There is always a challenge in creating good products and good user documents to ensure a market niche. A product undergoes many quality checks before its release. There are many documents that do not provide information to the user in times of need. Either the information is missing in the document or the user spends valuable time and effort in searching for the information due to a missing table of contents or bad indexing. All these problems can be avoided if the user document too undergoes rigorous quality tests. The various methods of testing user documents are elaborated in this Paper.

Documentation Tools
XML – A new approach to documentation: Through the ages, communication and exchange of information have undergone tremendous change. Yet uniformity in exchange of information has remained a great hurdle. With the advent of the digital age, the need for uniformity in transmission and universal utilization of information have become a priority. Such an effort in the digital domain is reflected in the creation of Extensible Markup Language (XML). The primary purpose of XML is sharing of data across different information systems, especially those connected through the Internet. XML enables diverse software to reliably understand information that is formatted and passed through languages based on it.
Documentation Transformation - Migration from Unstructured to Structured Documentation: Organizations have always had difficulty in managing large volumes of documentation, compelling them to look for ways and means to manage these with ease and efficiency. Difficulties crop up due to varied reasons such as creating and storing documents in various formats, and inconsistencies in the organization and presentation of content. All of which in a nutshell, is called unstructured documentation. A structured approach to documentation results in retrieving valuable information for the right purpose at the right time. This document addresses the problems faced in unstructured documentation and the reasons for migrating to structured documentation. It also explores the methods and means required to resolve the problems caused by unstructured documentation.
Implementation of DITA: A content management system (CMS) is a computer-based system that facilitates the organization, control, and publication of large volumes of documents and other content, such as images and multimedia resources. Most organizations or departments within these organizations follow internal style guides and standards for content or document management. To compete in the global marketplace, they are frequently faced with the challenge of adopting external standards, followed by other organizations that could be their clients or vendors. When it comes to content development, there are many advantages of adopting standards. Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) is one such standard. This document provides a perspective on how to implement DITA in your organization, based on your documentation needs.

 

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The Writers Block(TWB) is Asia’s leading technical communication and publishing services provider and caters to the needs of technology and process driven industries. TWB provides world-class technical communication outsourcing, corporate training and publishing services to companies globally. TWB's expertise spans industries that include IT technology Products & Outsourcing, ITES, Financial, Aerospace, Defense, Ship Building, Discrete & Process Manufacturing Industries. TWB offers a complete suite of services that allows its customers to effectively publish the technical knowledge and caters to over 60 large clients globally, including Cisco, NEC, Infosys, Accenture, Samsung, MindTree, Siemens, AOL, Titan, Intel, Wipro, CGN, BearingPoint, Tata Power, HAL, Uniliver, DRDO and several others. TWB offers training under the TWB Technical Writing Certification Programs and has a portfolio of over two dozen certifications available as training offerings. Over 200 companies including SAP Labs, Lucent Technologies, IBM, Wipro, TCS, Sun Microsystems hire TWB certified professionals through the TWB OnCampus program. TWB's expertise can be leveraged across functions which include Engineering, Software Development & Support knowledge through user manuals, quick reference guides and instruction guides, product overviews, Illustration/3D drawings; Marketing & Sales knowledge through whitepapers, case studies, newsletters, flyers, brochures, websites, blogs & forums and web based flash demos; Training, Implementation and Support knowledge through e-learning, demo’s, troubleshooting guides, course materials, installation guides, IETM generated documents and Process Documentation knowledge through ISO & CMMi documentation, policy manuals, process work flow documents.