§ Journal
Guides
7 min read
Writing a company handbook people actually search
Seven habits that make a handbook easier for people, and for tools like ours, to answer questions from.
Hana Voss
A good handbook is not longer. It is easier to quote.
Put the rule in the first sentence
Write ‘Expenses over $200 need approval from a manager’ before you explain why. Tools and people both find it faster.
One idea per heading
Headings are how readers scan and how we split documents into passages. A heading like ‘Travel’ is too broad, ‘Booking flights over $500’ is quotable.
Put dates on things
Anything that expires should say when. It lets a reader, or Ostler, mark it as old.
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Keep reading
Engineering
How we check that a source really says what we claim
A citation that points at the wrong page is worse than no citation. This is the checking step we run before an answer is shown.
Guides
Writing a company handbook people actually search
Seven habits that make a handbook easier for people, and for tools like ours, to answer questions from.
Research
What we learned from 40,000 unanswered questions
Most unanswered questions are not hard. They are missing a document nobody wrote down.
The Ostler letter
Notes like these, once a month.
New articles, release notes and one useful link.