Linux Documentation Project Reviewer HOWTO

David Merrill

david@lupercalia.net

Joy Yokley

jyokley@us.ibm.com

2001-05-12
Revision History                                                             
Revision 1.0.1            2001-05-12           Revised by: DCM               
Minor bugfixes.                                                              
Revision 1.0              2001-05-01           Revised by: jy                
Initial release.                                                             


This document will help you review LDP documentation. It includes procedures,
tips and techniques to make the process easier.

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Table of Contents
1. Introduction
    1.1. Copyright and License
   
   
2. Reviewing Newly Submitted Documentation
3. Reviewing Existing Documentation
    3.1. Choosing a Document
    3.2. License Issues
    3.3. Working With the Latest Version
    3.4. Picking a Review to Conduct
   
   
4. Technical Accuracy Review
5. Language Review
6. Reporting Your Results

1. Introduction

The LDP Review Project is a "working group" of the Linux Documentation
Project whose goal is to improve the quality of the LDP's documentation. We
are approaching that goal from two different angles: a review of newly
submitted documentation, and a review of existing documentation. Both
projects are at an early stage right now, so we are very much open to your
suggestions for improvement.

We have a mailing list established at http://www.lupercalia.net/mailman/
listinfo/ldp-review.
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1.1. Copyright and License

This document is copyright 2001 by David C. Merrill, Ph.D., and is released
under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, which is hereby
incorporated by reference. Send feedback to david@lupercalia.net.
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2. Reviewing Newly Submitted Documentation

This review project will continue throughout the life of the LDP. The process
will act as a front-end quality assurance review for new documentation which
is submitted to the LDP. Ideally documents will be reviewed within one week
of their submission to the LDP.

Coordinators of this effort will announce to the list or notify individual
review members of new document submissions. The coordinators will try to
funnel documents to reviewers who have knowledge in the same technical area
as the documentation. If the reviewer is not a technical expert in that
particular area and needs technical questions answered, there will be a
technical expert designated who will be able to address any technical issues
or questions.

Once reviewers have agreed to work on a document, they will have one week to
complete the review. If they are not able to complete the review within that
time frame, they will need to let the coordinator know of their difficulties
so that the author can be notified of the problem. Because these reviews need
to be conducted rather quickly, there will be times when reviewers will be
more able to accept review work.

When reviewing newly submitted documents, refer to the Section 4 and Section
5 portions of this guide for the types of information to verify and correct.
As a reviewer, you will need to check the documents out of the CVS and make
any necessary changes. If changes are extensive or if the document has
glaringly and fundamentally fatal errors, contact a coordinator to let him or
her know what the problems are. Once changes are made, the reviewer will
update the minor version number, submit the changes to the CVS, and send the
original author a copy of the source.
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3. Reviewing Existing Documentation

This project will focus on reviewing documentation that already exists on the
LDP. Our goal is to implement a quality management program that makes sure we
are supplying up-to-date, accurate, easily read documentation. This process
will be ongoing throughout the life of the LDP. Initially, we will try to
review all documents currently on the LDP. Once we have made our way through
existing documents, we will schedule dates for follow-up reviews. By
continually reviewing the documents throughout their life on the LDP, we help
make sure that readers have the best experience with Linux documentation.

In addition to the primary goal of improving the quality of the documentation
itself, we will also be gathering data about the collection for storage in
some sort of database to facilitate the ongoing management of the collection.
However, this stage of the review is still being defined; details about the
specifics and how this data will be measured will be added in the future.

Below are some general guidelines that you should follow before you begin
reviewing existing documentation for the LDP. Please try to have document
reviews completed within two weeks of the time you sign up to review a
document.
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3.1. Choosing a Document

Because this process is just getting started, there are many documents that
need review. The most important thing is that you coordinate your work with
the other reviewers. To coordinate the effort, we have set up a mailing list
for reviewers.

Notify the ldp-review list, which is currently housed at http://
www.lupercalia.net/mailman/listinfo/ldp-review, before you begin to review a
document. We want to make sure your work is directed where it is most needed
and where it will be most useful. Of course, you may have a particular area
of expertise and that will dictate your choice to some extent. You can ask on
the list for an assignment, or you can select one for yourself and just let
us know what you're doing.
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3.2. License Issues

Make sure you have the legal right to work on the document. If it is licensed
under a free license that specifically grants such rights, you are fine. If
not, you need to contact the author and get permission.

If you do not plan to actually change any of the content, but simply report
on the document's status, then you don't need permission, regardless of
license. Of course, it is still polite, and advisable, to write the author
anyway.
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3.3. Working With the Latest Version

Make sure the copy you are reviewing is the most current.

If your document includes a URL to an official homepage, visit that page and
see if it displays the same version number. If you find the same version
number, you are fine. If you find a newer version number, write to the author
and ask him or her to please submit the newer version to you.
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3.4. Picking a Review to Conduct

There are many different ways a document can be reviewed, and you may have
the skills to do only one or two types of reviews. It is sometimes useful
(and easier) to do each review as a separate pass through the document; Your
Mileage May Vary.

The following sections explain the various types of reviews we are
conducting. Use these sections as a guide to help you choose the type of
review to conduct and to help you conduct the review itself. Again, when you
post your review choice to the review list, please specify the type of review
you would like to be responsible for.
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4. Technical Accuracy Review

Make sure the facts as stated in the document are correct, helpful, and on
topic.

To do a technical accuracy review, you really need to know your subject
matter, probably as well or better than the original author. Use whatever
other documentation is available for your subject, including man pages,
program documentation, other printed books, etc. You might also use mailing
lists on the topic, asking for third parties to verify certain facts of which
you are in doubt.

When doing this type of review, consider if the information is only valid for
certain types of hardware or software. If this is the case, make sure to note
the limitations of the document within the document, either within the
abstract or as a note at the beginning of the document. For example, if the
solutions in the document only are relevant for one type or brand of
hardware, make sure that that limitation is defined. This will keep readers
from trying to apply a certain type of technology to an application or
situation where it will not work.
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5. Language Review

Because writers come from all types of backgrounds, there may be problems
within the documentation that need to be fixed. Writers may be very
knowledgeable in their subject areas but not great writers, or they may be
excellent writers but not completely fluent in the language of the document.
The language review addresses these types of problems by focusing on language
issues that make the document easier for the user to read and understand.
Some of the problems that may occur within the document are poor sentence
structure, grammar, organization, clarity, and spelling.

If you are doing a language review, you should be fluent in the language and
the structure of the language. You want to consider both the logic and
grammar of the document. Your primary goal in a language review is to
identify and correct areas that could lead to confusion for the reader/user
of the document. To this end, you can most certainly use language and grammar
references such as dictionaries and handbooks when in doubt.

Although this review does address the structure and delivery of the language,
you should not attempt to purge the document of individuality and personality
in an attempt to make it "sound better" or more technical. Stilted, humorless
language and structures are not the goals here. Again, your goal should be to
make the document clear, unambiguous, and correct in spelling and grammar.

Items to evaluate:

  * Spelling. Spelling should conform to a standardized English spelling of
    terms. For words that are new to the language and not yet standardized
    (e.g. technical Linux terminology that is generally accepted in the
    community), follow the most common spelling for the term.
   
    Note Note                                                        
         Because there are two generally accepted forms of English,  
         this review should not privilege American English spellings 
         over British English spellings, or vice-versa. For example, 
         if the author is writes British English and uses the word   
         "realise", you should not change the spelling of the word to
         "realize" just because you speak/write American English.    
   
  * Grammar. For the purposes of this review, grammar should address issues
    such as standards of subject/verb agreement, pronoun/antecedent
    agreement, etc. One of the common and confusing mistakes made in HOWTOs
    is unclear pronoun antecedents.
   
    For example, to say, "You will need to set several parameters in the
    config file to make it compile correctly. The ones you choose to set make
    a big difference." In this example it sounds like the config file is what
    is compiling and it takes a re-reading of the phrase for it to be clear
    that "The ones" refers to the parameters.
   
    Along these same lines, many authors writing for the LDP use smiley faces
    and exclamation points where they would never be accepted in formal
    documentation or grammar handbooks. The general rule to follow at this
    time is to leave the smiley faces and gratuitous punctuation marks in
    place unless they interfere with the reader's understanding of the
    concepts being explained. The rationale behind this is to protect the
    more conversational tone of the LDP documentation.
   
  * Capitalization. The word "HOWTO" should always be in full caps with no
    hyphen. Also, the document title should always be in title case. This
    means that first words in a title are always capitalized. The only words
    not capitalized in a title are prepositions, articles, and proper nouns
    which would not be capitalized otherwise (e.g. insmod). Other
    capitalization should follow rules of standard English.
   
  * Clarity. Judgements on clarity are sometimes difficult to make. One
    successful strategey in evaluating clarity is asking the question "If I
    did not already know this information, would the explanation be clear
    from this document." If it is confusing to you and you already generally
    understand what the author is trying to say, then there is a good chance
    that the explanation is really confusing for someone reading the document
    for the first time. If you run across this situation, and you don't
    really know how to correct the technical explanation, or you are afraid
    your changes might affect the meaning of the document, ask for help from
    a technical expert. If no technical expert is available or no one
    responds to your requests, note the needed changes in the review and mark
    that these concerns need to be addressed in the technical review.
   
  * Organization. In some cases the document would really benefit from a
    different structure. You should address these issues when they interfere
    with the understanding of the information within the document. If a
    document gives background information after a procedure has been
    performed, this may well be too late for the reader to fully consider the
    information he or she needs before performing the task. Look for document
    organization that might confuse or mislead the reader. These will be the
    types of issues you want to address. Once these are identified, it may be
    worthwhile to let the author know your rationale and discuss major
    changes with him or her.
   
  * Sentence Structure. To some extent, sentence structure issues are
    discussed in the grammar section; however, there are some additional
    issues that are not grammatically incorrect but do interfere with the
    readers comprehension of the material. One of the most noticable of these
    is stacked prepositional phrases. Stacked prepositional phrases become a
    problem when the document's readability suffers because it becomes less
    and less clear what the subject and action of the sentence are. In some
    cases more precise descriptors are needed or sentences need to be changed
    from one long sentence that is hard to comprehend, to two or three more
    easily read sentences.
   
  * Readability. This area is somewhat subjective. What passes for fairly
    readable material to one person might be confusing to someone else.
    Because this is a value judgement you should be cautious when marking up
    an author's work for readability. Realize when basing a judgement on
    readability that you might be dealing with preferences of style. At this
    point in time within the LDP, there is no set style or stylistic rules
    that authors need to follow. In evaluating readability you must consider
    whether or not the way the document is written truly interferes with the
    readers understanding of the information. If the answer you come up with
    is "No, but it doesn't sound like I think it should." then you should
    probably not re-write the text to make it sound better to you.
   
  * Versioning. Every document should have a version number, preferably in
    the form Major.Minor.Bugfix, where each section is an integer. Some
    authors use Alan Cox style versions (e.g., 1.4pre-3) and some include
    additional information (e.g., 1.3beta). This is acceptable but not
    encouraged. The most important thing is that we have a version number so
    we know which version we are dealing with! Once a document goes through
    review it should advance in minor or bugfix version number, depending on
    the amount of change introduced.
   
  * Title. The title should be in proper title case. The general principle
    for this is that all words are capitalized in a title except prepositions
    and articles (an article will be capitalized if it is the first word in
    the title). The word HOWTO should be in all capital letters. There should
    be no hyphens within the word HOWTO (with the exception of the
    Mini-HOWTO). The version should not be included in the title.
   
  * Date Formats. Dates should be in standard ISO format, which is
    YYYY-MM-DD.
   
  * Uniform Use of Terms. Because the HOWTO you are reviewing is probably
    filled with new information for the reader, it is important that the
    terms discussed throughout the document be uniform. For example,
    referring to a part or parameter in one section of the document by one
    name and then calling it by another name (or an abbreviation that has not
    be explained) in another part of the document is confusing for the
    reader. Making sure that terms are the same throughout the document goes
    a long way in helping the reader understand the documentation.
   
  * Definitions of Acronyms or Slang. Terminology and language within the
    realm of computer technology changes rapidly. In reviewing documents you
    may find that many of the terms that are being discussed are not valid
    words in any dictionary or technical reference that you are familiar
    with. In this case you will need to search on terms and find if they are,
    in fact, terminology that is accepted in the general Linux community.
    Terms that are less familiar should be defined immediately following the
    first instance of the term. Slang should be replaced with more common
    terminology if the slang will causes the reader to be confused by the
    connotation or denotation of the term. Remember that readers using the
    document may not come to English as a primary language and, therefore,
    you should do your best to make sure that the document is as easy to
    understand as possible.
   

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6. Reporting Your Results

Once you have completed your review of a document, you should send your
results back to the working group. The coordinator will record your work in
the database. The coordinator will not need the updated source, but he or she
will need any metrics you have collected and your notes. He or she will also
need to know which types of review you have completed.

If you have made any modifications to the document, also send your updates to
the author or maintainer, as well as the LDP Submission List, which is at 
submit@linuxdoc.org.
