Calling It Finished

Quality testing

Quality assurance can be a special problem for web sites and online help. You should definitely test your electronic documentation to make sure it works before you go live with it. But you don't have to examine every page in minute detail. Even quality assurance professionals don't that. Instead, they look to limit the number of errors to a certain frequency or percentage. Why? Because they know that anything a human being produces will have mistakes in it. They also know that they have a limited budget to complete their task. So they must aim for a standard and stick to it. You should do the same.

While I sometimes forget to do that on this web site, I do make an effort each time I post an update to make sure the links work. I usually run a spell check too (although some readers have been kind enough to point out typos and word usage problems that I missed). But once I perform those two tasks, I post the new content. I figure if someone comes across a mistake, I can fix it at that time.

To prevent quality assurance testing from stalling project completion, you should set standards, such as an error frequency, and stick to them. Once your documentation falls within those standards, it's time to ship it off. You could provide users with a way to contact the documentation department if a problem occurs. If your users find an error, they will no doubt tell you. If your users feel like you're taking care of any mistakes they come across, however, they won't mind the mistakes all that much. (You'll still get the regular complainers, but those people can never be satisfied.)