*Technical Writing

The Department of Defense (DOD) has undertaken major research and development programs to improve the quality of their documentation, yet there continue to be major deficiencies in the quality of the manuals produced. In an attempt to identify factors in the design and development process that may be contributing to such deficiencies, this project studied five pablication houses, four of which produced DOD technical manuals. Writers, managers, and illustrators were interviewed at each site to obtain information on the work flow in developing a manual; the use of specifications; the validation and verification process; and the skills and duties of writers, illustrators, and government representatives. This report presents an introductory review of the literature; a description of the research methodology; and discussions of the findings on specification use and deficiencies, cost of inadequate/inappropriate specifications, relative effort in the workflow, the government's technical manual representative, writers and their qualifications and training, writers ' job duties, source materials, degree of automation, comprehensiveness, illustrations, quality assurance, validation, and verification. A final discussion of the study results and their implications, a list of 29 references, and a flow chart of a typical technical information development process conclude the report. (THC) * Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * * from the original document. * r