2019-10-15 Documentation meeting agenda/notes

ArchivesSpace Help Center

Jessica did a quick demo of the User Manual in Confluence. It's a separate space in the wiki at the moment, accessible only to the program team and to UAC Docs. (In the future only the program team and UAC Docs will have editing capabilities for the User Manual; others will be able to comment and create issues)

Need to figure out authentication -- because it's a benefit of membership, access to it needs to be controlled. LYRASIS is going to be working on this part. User Manual as a guide for how to access training videos -- LYRASIS is working on this as well. Docs will be responsible only for the management of the documentation.

Versioning -- not a separate user manual, only child pages for each section representing the older versions. Possibility to have versioned user manuals?

Mechanisms for feedback. Users can create issues; how should we respond to issues or comments? Formalized process needed.

How to make edits?

• Review process for changes?
• Save drafts for review and feedback? (Make changes but do not publish)

Some features that would make the User Manual easier to use are not available to our current hosted instance of Confluence. LYRASIS is considering hosting their own instance of it so that users can hover over terms that appear in the Manual (instead of linking out to a separate glossary page), among other things.

UAC Docs and program team members can edit and comment on all User Manual pages now, so we can start on editorial and review tasks at any time.

Jasmine: Should we set up a separate channel for User Manual issues so that UAC Docs has a single place to go to resolve issues, and so that they aren't included in the ArchivesSpace application issues queue? Jessica will look into this. Users may be more likely to comment with questions or suggestions rather than create a new issue. Or we could get rid of issue creation entirely and only use comments for this...

It's possible to see who made a change to a page in the User Manual in that page's edit history.

Ideas for work plan for 2019-20?

• Formalize editing, review, and publication processes for the User Manual in Confluence
• User Manual update process for new releases
  • Would cross-over with Testing or other groups who use new releases more often, more immediately than the average user be helpful? Or review of the release notes to see what has changed?
  • Do we have access to the instance used by the Testing team?
  • How far in advance of a release or release candidate could Docs get access to the testing instance so we know what needs to be changed in the User Manual? i.e. what forms and sub-record forms have changed, what fields are now required that are no longer required
• Review of content in the User Manual – are there types of instruction or documentation that are missing from the User Manual that could be included in it? Who would volunteer to write it? Is there feedback from the documentation writers' survey that would be useful for that review?

Languages are getting worked on by Jessica and Christine and it should be in the User Manual soon.

There is also a need for documentation about the ability to create ARKs for archival objects (and other record types?) in ArchivesSpace.

Need a page on how to use the Manual (and maybe how to use the new Help Center in general).

Meeting monthly now; Doodle poll for a November meeting to follow. Jasmine and Kevin will also prepare a formal work plan document for the year with action items for the year and for the next meeting specifically.