Calling It Finished

Redesigning

A fatal mistake, especially when committed late in the production cycle, is to change the basic design of a document. Any changes can lead to unforeseen problems in consistency and printing. Large changes, such as page size or margins, can cause formatting and pagination problems that may take a long time to fix. Even small changes, like font weight, can cause consistency problems. If this doesn't seem like a big problem, consider the following. Users rely on consistency within documentation to find information. If you mark links to external sources in blue and popups in green in one online help file and do the opposite in another, users will first find the change confusing and then annoying.

The best way to avoid problems caused by redesigning your documentation, is not to do it. Create a thorough design when you first begin a new project and follow it. While there may be some instances in which the design must be circumvented, any necessary changes should not be carried out late in the production cycle. They should be handled as early as possible, and implemented with consistency.