How long does it take?

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How long does it take to have a document written?

“How long is a piece of string?” Like most projects, the answer is, “it all depends”. The time taken depends on such factors as: the type and completeness of the source material; the difficulty of the ideas or tasks to be presented; how stable the base information is; how much time you have to spend on reviews, and so on.

The best way to give you an idea is by an example.

Sample times

Here are some sample times for each stage of a recent job, but remember that each job is different:

To produce a first draft of 150-page user guide, based on a computer simulation of the product: four weeks, including designing the layout and getting information from developers.
To get the first draft reviewed by developers: ten days.
To produce a second draft, incorporating comments and corrections from developers: two weeks, including resolving conflicting comments from different developers.
To get the second draft reviewed by developers and QA department: two weeks.
To produce a first version, incorporating comments from the second draft review: two weeks, including resolving conflicting comments from different developers.
To get the first version approved and signed off by QA and senior management: two weeks.
Total time taken: 13.5 weeks.

There are many factors which can delay a documentation project. In my experience the main problems are: the product is not complete so the first draft has information missing as no one knows exactly what parts of it will do; graphics are not available; developers are too busy finalising the product to review the documentation, this can mean that the first draft is not checked thoroughly and errors are noticed at a later date so another draft or version needs to be issued.

My thanks to Lois Wakeman for her permission to adapt the ideas from her website, http://communicationarts.co.uk.