What I’m Working on Now!

What are you working on right now?

Doc-To-Help Migration to MadCap Flare – Managing a project to migrate (7) D2H NetHelp to MadCap Flare HTML5.

Microsoft Visual Studio Online – Using this tool to document and track Board and Work Items.

Agile Project Management – On the development team charged with converting our Data Portal to the MVC architecture and developing a Data Admin Tool for managing roles and permissions using Agile Project Management customized for our environment. The team is delivering value in the form of releasable software at frequent regular intervals (end of a sprint). 

Documentation – As we build releasable components of the application, I had to identify best practices to follow. For example, use single source methodology, start with models I want to keep current, put information in the most appropriate place, document with a purpose (iterative approach), leverage use of existing documentation, just to new a few. The Data Portal integrated online help is also converted to the new Doc-To-Help Responsive Theme design. This compliments the Data Portal new dashboard look and feel with its widgets that all work together and all sorts of user assistances such as handy links to FAQ, Search Help and About Data Portal.

Testing – Our Testing/QA process has become more structured requiring an automated testing solution to test the releasable component of the software. We are using Microsoft Test Manager as it supports the technologies we build on (ASP, .NET, MVC, to name a few) for manual and automated testing. Application is not releasable until done. Test in this case example means the page or link works. Releasable in this case means we that we actually know that it is initially doing what we want it to do. For example, clicking on a page or link opens the page or link. Or clicking a topic > then Help launches the online help for that specific topic. For example you’ve verified context sensitive help works.

Team Foundation Server (TFS) – Code management, reporting, requirements, and project management (agile software development) build automation, testing and release management capabilities. Benefit: Team Collaboration, Reuse of content.