That is certainly a goal, Gary, but Wayne and Eric are adamant about my incorporating any customer feedback that makes sense no matter how many changes it requires. Little of that feed back is direct about the manual although I appreciate hearing about any overlooked typos, etc. Most often the changes are clarifications and additions in response to questions directed to Customer Support because a step wasn't clear.
The hard and fast goal for the first revision of any manual is for the very first customer who gets the product to be able to easily and correctly build it (if a kit) and operate it. After that the changes are all refinements, but there are often many. On the kit assembly manuals (Wayne handles the KX3, K3 and several other Owner's manuals and looks 'over my shoulder' on the rest), I sit down with only the tools listed in the manual and approach the kit as a first-time builder while writing the first draft. Then I tear the rig apart and do it again to validate the steps. And often a third and fourth time to try alternate assembly techniques or to confirm that the corrections I made to the first draft are correct. The KX3 on my desk has been apart at least a dozen times so far. The K3 well over 30 times, and the KPA500 about as many. And that's why I monitor the reflector and Yahoo group. Comments there alert me to things still overlooked about any of the current products. 73, Ron AC7AC -----Original Message----- *Bruce, the second advantage of doing this is to refine the manual and reduce as many of the errata changes as possible. Remember too that the manual writer only wants to do the job of writing once and needs feedback from users to allow the author to write the manual in such a way as to help users understand the equipment and when it comes to assembly it helps with the wording of that manual also. 73 Gary ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
