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Word vs. InDesign? Help!
Hi everyone,
I'm a former graphic designer who is now creating training manuals for my employer. I am much more familiar with InDesign than I am with Word. For the moment, my employer wants to stay with Word rather than buy me a copy of InDesign. His decision is mainly based on price, but from the price of other types of software out there (DocToHelp, etc.) that technical writers use, I think he may reconsider since they are almost the same. However, I need to demonstrate that going with InDesign is the right decision in other ways. I dont know enough about Word to say for sure, so Im asking for some help from those of you who have used Word for similar projects. Here are the parameters of the project: 1. I will be creating a series of training manuals for 8 different departments, with a 7 month timeline. Graphics (screen shots, mostly) will be used in some parts of the manuals. 2. We would like to be able to publish the documents we create on the company intranet. Ideally, these documents would be able to link to each other when necessary. Heres what I dont know about Word and need your help with: 1. Is there any way that Word can know when youve updated one of the linked documents and automatically update that link for you? 2. Im thinking that the best way to do this project is to save each section as a separate document, so that I can control it better. The idea of dealing with a 50 page Word document and trying to find out exactly where things are seems daunting compared to doing that in InDesign. However, if any of you have other suggestions on a better way to approach the project, I am quite willing to listen! So, how would you approach this if it were your project? Can I use Word effectively to do the project? Many Thanks! Many thanks, Sarah W |
#2
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Word vs. InDesign? Help!
InDesign is a page layout application. Word isn't. That distinction aside,
Word is capable of doing what you want. You may just have to adapt your technique. 1. Linked Word documents will be updated every time you update the links. That would be automatic if the target and linked documents were both open. Or you could manually update the links (F9) or use a macro such as that at http://www.gmayor.com/installing_macro.htm 2. You could use a series of IncludeText fields to insert a range of documents that you wish to keep separate. If you are working with a lot of screen shots, SnagIt will save you a lot of time and won't break your employer's bank. -- Graham Mayor - Word MVP My web site www.gmayor.com Word MVP web site http://word.mvps.org Sarah W wrote: Hi everyone, I'm a former graphic designer who is now creating training manuals for my employer. I am much more familiar with InDesign than I am with Word. For the moment, my employer wants to stay with Word rather than buy me a copy of InDesign. His decision is mainly based on price, but from the price of other types of software out there (DocToHelp, etc.) that technical writers use, I think he may reconsider since they are almost the same. However, I need to demonstrate that going with InDesign is the right decision in other ways. I don't know enough about Word to say for sure, so I'm asking for some help from those of you who have used Word for similar projects. Here are the parameters of the project: 1. I will be creating a series of training manuals for 8 different departments, with a 7 month timeline. Graphics (screen shots, mostly) will be used in some parts of the manuals. 2. We would like to be able to publish the documents we create on the company intranet. Ideally, these documents would be able to link to each other when necessary. Here's what I don't know about Word and need your help with: 1. Is there any way that Word can know when you've updated one of the linked documents and automatically update that link for you? 2. I'm thinking that the best way to do this project is to save each section as a separate document, so that I can control it better. The idea of dealing with a 50 page Word document and trying to find out exactly where things are seems daunting compared to doing that in InDesign. However, if any of you have other suggestions on a better way to approach the project, I am quite willing to listen! So, how would you approach this if it were your project? Can I use Word effectively to do the project? Many Thanks! Many thanks, Sarah W |
#3
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Word vs. InDesign? Help!
Thanks for the info, Graham. I really appreciate it and will look into your
suggestions! "Graham Mayor" wrote: InDesign is a page layout application. Word isn't. That distinction aside, Word is capable of doing what you want. You may just have to adapt your technique. 1. Linked Word documents will be updated every time you update the links. That would be automatic if the target and linked documents were both open. Or you could manually update the links (F9) or use a macro such as that at http://www.gmayor.com/installing_macro.htm 2. You could use a series of IncludeText fields to insert a range of documents that you wish to keep separate. If you are working with a lot of screen shots, SnagIt will save you a lot of time and won't break your employer's bank. -- Graham Mayor - Word MVP My web site www.gmayor.com Word MVP web site http://word.mvps.org Sarah W wrote: Hi everyone, I'm a former graphic designer who is now creating training manuals for my employer. I am much more familiar with InDesign than I am with Word. For the moment, my employer wants to stay with Word rather than buy me a copy of InDesign. His decision is mainly based on price, but from the price of other types of software out there (DocToHelp, etc.) that technical writers use, I think he may reconsider since they are almost the same. However, I need to demonstrate that going with InDesign is the right decision in other ways. I don't know enough about Word to say for sure, so I'm asking for some help from those of you who have used Word for similar projects. Here are the parameters of the project: 1. I will be creating a series of training manuals for 8 different departments, with a 7 month timeline. Graphics (screen shots, mostly) will be used in some parts of the manuals. 2. We would like to be able to publish the documents we create on the company intranet. Ideally, these documents would be able to link to each other when necessary. Here's what I don't know about Word and need your help with: 1. Is there any way that Word can know when you've updated one of the linked documents and automatically update that link for you? 2. I'm thinking that the best way to do this project is to save each section as a separate document, so that I can control it better. The idea of dealing with a 50 page Word document and trying to find out exactly where things are seems daunting compared to doing that in InDesign. However, if any of you have other suggestions on a better way to approach the project, I am quite willing to listen! So, how would you approach this if it were your project? Can I use Word effectively to do the project? Many Thanks! Many thanks, Sarah W |
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