How to Create Spotless Software Documentation

Let’s be honest, creating software documentation is a tricky thing. Every company has its own workflow and requires you to be highly attentive so as not to lose anything important and yet make the articles as straightforward as possible. Fortunately, there are several best practices that will help you create reliable documentation more confidently. Get yourself the best software for technical writing and get ready to learn! 

1. Understand Your Audience and Documentation Purposes

Take a deep breath and answer why you are about to create a piece of documentation for a software product. It seems to be a simple question, but it’s very easy to omit the real purposes and the target audience requirements. Your mission is to highlight the right purpose of the document you will create. Here’s how to do it the best way:

1. Start a blank document.
2. Jot down all the answers that come into your head.
3. Highlight the right purposes based on the target audience portrait.

Your understanding of the target audience must be very clear as it defines how your document will look in the end. It might sound trivial, but you should think of real personas who will read the document. This will help you reach the right results for sure. 

2. Highlight All Important Questions

Every technical document has to address specific pain points and answer all the questions that the target audience might have while using the piece of software you describe. Once you finish with the previous step and figure out who your audience is and what are the main goals of the documentation, you have to do your best to anticipate which questions these real people will have. That is why it’s so important to figure out who you write for first. 

In the document you’ve created for the first step, create a FAQ section. Fill it with questions in order to collect thoughts for the final document you will create later. You should consider it as a preparational phase, not a part of the document you will publish, so be patient and do your best to ask as many reasonable questions as possible. 

3. Create Document Outline

If you are about to write your first software documentation, you have to take time to thoroughly prepare the right structure from scratch. It’s important that there’s no 100% universal template for all software products, so you have to create it considering the features of the software you write about. That’s where the goals and the audience portrait you highlighted in the first step will come in handy again. 

Below are the points you should include in your document outline: 

1. The title of the document and the “name” of its target audience;
2. A quick summary of the content in the document;
3. The clear goals of your document;
4. Comprehensive requirements for the readers (if needed);
5. The list of instructions, solutions, codes, or whatever is applicable in your situation;
6. Timeline of document creation;
7. Any applicable references.

Be ready that creating an outline can take an entire day, but you will know how the document has to look better than anyone in the end. Use the help of a graphic designer to make your outline easier to perceive and use it as a template for the document you will write. 

4. Do the Research to Gather Information

You might know everything about the product you are going to write about or have zero knowledge about it. In both cases, you need to conduct in-depth research of the product to gather relevant up-to-date information and validate what you already know. 

This phase may include interviewing SMEs (subject matter experts), assessment of the existing software product documentation, research, etc. You have to process all the available information into a usable database and then distribute the pieces of data between the points of your outline. Don’t forget to keep references wherever it can add credibility to the final document. 

5. Create the Draft

Phew! Now you are finally ready to create the draft of the document. Ensure that you’ve created an outline that’s solid enough to let you create a substantial draft. If you have enough initial info, creating the draft should be a quick and easy task for you. Here are several tips that will make the process even simpler:

• Use plain language;
• Avoid any ambiguous points;
• Avoid editing the draft to save time;
• Don’t use any jargon;
• Write as much as you need and nothing else;
• Refer to the target audience and the goals of your writing.

6. Don’t Forget About the Visuals

Once the draft is ready, you should augment it with visuals, including useful illustrations, flowcharts, screenshots from the software you write about, etc. You can also insert links to the embedded content, such as videos and interactive elements. It might be also useful to create drafts of graphs if needed. Later, your graphic designer will process them into a unified style. 

There’s no need to add useless visuals, so make sure that all the pics you add help you explain technical concepts, help readers understand features better, enhance navigation in the software product, etc. 

7. Do the “Final Cut”

Now that you have a great draft with visuals, it’s time to edit the document to turn it into a well-polished final document. Before you start editing, decide on how many rounds of edits the document needs to ensure you don’t miss anything. The editing process might involve working with an editor, SMEs, or anyone else who’s into the context of your technical writing. If you’ve accomplished all the previous steps thoroughly enough, the number of edits will be minimal and feel like a breath of fresh air. 

No Rushing

Good software documentation cannot be created in a rush. It’s not breaking news that will be useless tomorrow, but a wiki that will serve the purposes of the product and its clients for years. Follow the best practices described above and never refuse to take extra time for planning and editing. That’s the true way to perfection.