Years of collaboration
2023 – ongoing
Context
A manufacturer of cutting edge radar equipment
EWST make radar simulation equipment used in military training exercises, allowing simulations of warfare scenarios in various terrain and conditions. Their product suite features mobile equipment that can be used both on land and at sea. EWST equipment is modular, which helps tailor the package to the customer’s needs.
Aim
Migrating from old tools to modern, user friendly formats
EWST needed to move their complex and hard-to-read FrameMaker manuals for radar simulation equipment to a modern and more efficient authoring environment, while simplifying the content structure and improving navigation. The migrated content would become a basis for future updates to other documents. An additional goal was to make the manuals more appealing and in accordance with the customer’s newest branding guidelines.
EWST also wanted to trial their documentation in an HTML format, and needed an experienced partner with the right skills for the job. 3di additionally suggested preparation of an HTML proof of concept.
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Challenges
Lack of internal resourcing, and documentation that needed modernising
EWST faced several challenges in creating documentation for its radar simulation equipment. They did not have an internal authoring team, and their previous documentation was very complex, heavy on graphics and not optimally laid out. Some documentation also featured old information and outdated branding.
On the technical side, the documentation lacked a unified style, was not optimised for reuse, and did not support HTML outputs, which EWST wanted to provide to their customers.
EWST needed a documentation partner that could update and improve their current content, facilitate documentation navigation, unify its branding and styling conventions, and at the same time migrate the content to a new platform, and restructure it for easy reuse and publishing in the HTML format.
Solution
Simplified documentation, created new visuals and migrated content to new tools
The 3di team:
- Analysed the existing FrameMaker manuals and identified possible improvements, for example, addition of hub pages (for potential HTML outputs in the future) and removal of a large number of non-essential screenshots.
- Suggested a restructuring of information flow, so the content is laid out in a user-oriented manner.
- Prepared a Flare template with improved visuals and new branding, where content would be migrated.
- Prepared migration guidelines, to guarantee consistency across the migrated documentation suite.
- Migrated the content from FrameMaker into MadCap Flare, introducing formatting upgrades, hub pages, and improved navigation.
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Result
EWST has modern documentation, available in a variety of formats
The 3di team:
- Supplied the customer with PDF outputs of the migrated documentation.
- Delivered the Flare project and a Flare template that the customer can use in the future.
- Provided EWST with a proof of concept of the HTML output from the authoring tool. In future, using the same content, the customer can quickly provide their documentation in the HTML format.
- Carried out the first documentation set migration into Flare, giving EWST a good base for creating new documentation in MadCap’s authoring software.
- Created the final output, which is much more user-friendly, boasting improved information flow, better navigation, and a lighter approach to visuals.